Pluralis Majestatis
by TobyKikami
Summary: [BOFIV] Ryu realizes a terrible consequence of merging with Fou Lu and seeks to remedy the situation, while doing what he can for the world without Endless.
1. That Which Passed

AUTHOR'S NOTES: This fic is rated PG-13 for violence and creepitude. Also, massive spoilers for Breath of Fire IV are within. You have been warned.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own anything of Breath of Fire IV besides a copy of the game, a soundtrack, and a strategy guide.

Pluralis Majestatis

Chapter One: That Which Passed

Nina thought the strangest thing about the days and nights that had passed since their battle with the First Emperor was how identical they were to the ones that had come before. She'd expected visible change, a shift in the stars, at least a conspicuous silence emanating from the gap left by the Endless. But she could forget for an hour at a time that they had gone.

The words passed around the campfire were the same - she thought Ershin might have been acting a little odd, but then Ershin had always been a little odd. _Another day to Sonne village, it's a good thing we have all this fish, what a relief to have gone past that hexed forest and don't you wonder why they fired on their own lands?_

Cray had passed the last query to Ryu, and his response had been immediate. "He was passing through that forest. They aimed the hex at him. Fou-Lu, I mean."

"That's terrible." Her words sounded false and routine, but there hadn't been much else she could think to say. From around the campfire had come murmured variations.

He'd nodded. "Yes. It was terrible." And the subject was dropped.

As she finished wiping off her plate Nina glanced around for Ryu and found him sitting at the edge of the camp, sword and fishing pole lying beside him; he alternately polished the one and adjusted the line of the other. That was another thing. The Ryu who stood tall and proud, who had reassured then told her "I am also Fou-Lu," had disappeared fast as he had arrived. Maybe it had to do with being complete, had to do with the power of the Yorae Dragon. Maybe that power had influenced him for that little time - influenced him to cast it away.

She marveled that she could think so clearly about the happenings of two days past. The giddy afterglow -_ I helped to save the world_ - was now little more than dim flickers that failed to drive away the worries.

She put away her dish and cutlery and went over. "Are you okay?"

He looked up. "Oh - Nina. I'm fine. How're you?"

"I'm okay."

He saw the lie, as she had hoped. "Please - sit down." As she did so, he apparently lost interest in the sword and pole and delved into a pocket. From there he produced a small round gold bell and shook it in his hands as he listened.

"It's about home," she started. "The Ludian troops at P'ung Tap. Scias-" she lowered her voice, "-he's a great friend, I'm glad to have him around, but back then… he must have told them we went home - Wyndia, that is," she corrected herself, as she had been and was the only Wyndian in the group, "- for protection."

He nodded. "That can hardly improve relations."

"And when we went to Worent after getting Cray out - a lot of the Worens were angry with Ludia, pushing for war…"

"Some must have cooled off after a while."

"They might've, but the rest? We could go back right into the middle of that war."

"Why haven't you brought this up with the others?"

Nina shook her head. "And make_ them_ all worried too? Well, there's nothing we can do till we get home, so I had better not think about it any more. Oh, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have-"

"Oh, no. Go on. Please."

"There's not much else I can say, really." _Not much that doesn't have to do with Elina. _

The people of Wyndia, including Elina herself, would have been quite shocked at the amount of anger she had been able to gather and aim toward the man who had been ultimately responsible for her sister's death - the Imperial official Yuna. She thought that if she were thrown in the Carronade and fired at him, without the usual preliminaries, the resulting hex would make North Chamba a haven of sunshine and adorable furry animals in comparison.

But that was nothing to tell Ryu.

He nodded. "I know." Again it seemed he knew exactly what her secret meaning was. "At least you won't have to worry about the Empire invading while the war's going on."

"Why not?"

"It looks like Ursula's the highest-ranked by default, since most of the high command's been taken out, one way or another. General Rhun, for one, and a lot of the soldiers he took with him -" Nina winced as she remembered Ursula telling them she intended to look for Rhun; even she must have known the man had been dying when finally they caught up to him. "The Thirteenth Emperor, Rasso, Yohm-"

"Yohm? Who's Yohm?"

He stopped shaking the bell and brought a hand to his forehead. "Did I say that?" She nodded. "One of the generals - we never met him. I think it's an echo. One of Fou-Lu's memories. I get them from time to time."

"Are they… bad memories?"

"Hard to say, really. It's just little bits, sights and sounds - you remember the hermit in the Zhinga Mountains? The one who taught us all those fighting techniques?"

"Oh yes - his name was Bunyan, right?"

"Mm-hm. Bunyan. I saw him - I don't know, differently. And there was this bell…"

"Like the one you have?" Nina indicated it.

Ryu looked down and nodded. "I found it in the throne room. After we came down from the roof."

"I wonder what it was doing there."

"I guess they used it in ceremonies or something." He didn't look too convinced of this. "I keep on hearing it. In my head, not when it actually jingles."

"That's interesting. You think it might've been important to him? Not this one, necessarily, but one like it."

"One like it. Yes." He didn't look too convinced of this either. "Wonder why."

She began to get up. "Thanks for listening to me, Ryu."

"The pleasure's all mine." He got up with her, then leaned toward her. "I'm sorry about your sister."

"Uh? You already said that... a long time ago."

"I wish I'd thought to save her while I was at it."

_Oh, Ryu. _She shook her head. "You're too kind. She was gone by then. Nothing could have-"

"I might have managed," he said. "I don't know how much I could have done with all that power. But if I kept it longer than I had to, I thought, I wouldn't have been able to give it up nearly so easily. Stupid!" His hand went back up to his forehead. "I could've at least found out if I could've done it!"

"It's all right, Ryu," she told him. "Nobody's asking you to save the world. Once in a lifetime's enough."

* * *

When Nina had gone he felt free to really speculate about the bell. In ceremonies, he'd said. That could have been right after all… tied up in a bunch and shaken, maybe one had fallen off? 

_No. It was attached to her hair. It jingled when she walked. _

_In _whose_ hair?_

Ryu froze and stared at the thing in his hand. He saw it glinting in her hair (but whose hair, again?) with its twin; the hair was brown and tied back with the same ribbon that held the bell; most of the hair above that point was concealed by a white kerchief. She turned and he saw her tentative smile. He remembered.

_I never met her, not the me I was. But Fou-Lu did. I saw her, in his memory before we fought, before we merged. He called it fleeting sentiments, meaningless, but he didn't mean that, did he?_

It was night, a one-room cottage, she knelt next to him - no, Fou-Lu - no, him, he was also Fou-Lu after all - and as blood hurried to their faces she said - _I canno' stand t'see ye look so sad. _

Then she was in the day and she hurried toward him, the bell jingling. She spoke - her words were only half-remembered but they carried a general tone of concern. He rebuffed her - no, Fou-Lu had, he couldn't think of himself saying that.

_Thou shouldst not involve thyself in mine affairs!_

She leaned forward as her hands moved in an unconscious pattern, her fingers locking, interlocking, unlocking. _B-but… if'n I didn't want t'be… involvin' m'self, I wouldn'tve helped you in the first place! _

And in the center of a wavering ruin of a hex he (_Fou-Lu_) lay coughing blood. A gleam fell from the intact blue above. As it landed before him it emitted a single familiar sound, and before the bell had properly come to rest he knew what it was, and whose it was.

Ryu shut his eyes as the pained, hysterical yowls of remembered laughter faded in his mind, then opened them to stare again. _He - I - had it with him, when he - I - went to Chedo… when he - I - was in the castle…_

The blood from the Dragonslayer wound trickled downward, staining the fabric. He was seated on the throne of the Empire and he looked at the object in his open palm. He closed his fingers around it, then shook his head, sending strands of pale hair into his eyes, which closed. And as they closed he moved his arm and let go. He didn't open his eyes again till the tinkling had faded.

_Fou-Lu loved her. I am Fou-Lu and so I loved her. I remember her and I loved her and I never knew her. That's impossible, isn't it? _

It's not as if one of us had the tongue and the other had the hands. Split in two. Hundreds of years ago. Hundreds of years ago we were one. He had to rest for so long because he was not complete. He waited for me, he was looking for me. I_ was looking for me, I mean. No, wait. Right the first time._ He_ was. _

Why did we think that once we reunited everything would be all right? Did we think we'd just blend back to the way we'd been hundreds of years ago? How could we - how could I ever think two minds would fit in one body for a lifetime without one giving way?

He shuddered and began to shake the bell again, with quick jerks of his arms and his joined hands. _I am Ryu and I used to be a half-god and I haven't had my first birthday and I have years of someone's - who used to be me - memories inside of me and from those I remember General Yohm who I never saw and a girl with a bell who I never knew and her name was_ - "Mami."

He nearly choked when he realized he had said it himself; it had been identical to what he remembered of Fou-Lu's voice. _And I don't only have his memories, either. I have him._

"Fou-Lu," he said, reasoning that if he could tell the name of the girl, Mami, then it could work the other way. "Don't show me any more. Hold on to yourself. We were one once, but it's been a long time." He paused. "You're you and I'm me."

Another pause, and his nose felt funny and was he about to cry? He went on. "Don't get too close to me. I never wanted you to die. Remember I never wanted that." If Fou-Lu had even heard his warning, he gave no sign.

As Ryu listened to the sound of the bell, as his arms began to tire, he thought he saw a familiar shape in the darkness around the camp.


	2. Sanctuary

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thanks to all those who reviewed, as well as to Raya and Rastlin Majere of the Project Freakdom board for their comments. Okay - from here on out, while regular reviews are definitely appreciated, I would desperately welcome feedback on how well I do the "archaic" speech, Scias's stutter, et cetera. This is to avoid the monstrosities that emerged from some of my previous ficcage. Thanks again. 

Chapter Two: Sanctuary

"Don't they at least have something once in a while? Groceries, or I hear the Angel Fish makes a killer shisu, and they deliver."

Norris glanced back at the stairs that led to Astana Base and shrugged. "They're thaumaturgists, aren't they? Expect they're so busy working out things they forget about eating."

His fellow soldier Pasho gaped and nearly dropped his pike. "The Emperor dead and the gods gone and they're busy _working out things_ as usual?"

"They could be working out why the gods're gone, you know," said Norris, a shade reproachfully.

"Sorry." They watched the people mill outside. "Everyone was so cheerful in the old days," Pasho ventured after a time. "I kind of wish we were back at war, don't you? Least people were happy then."

"What with the Emperor dead and the gods gone, they're not going to be celebrating in the streets, are they?" He was right, though - at least during the war everyone in the city was bustling about, united with purpose, doing all they could for the Empire.

Now… some had questioned whether there was really much of an Empire anymore. The general reassuring hubbub of Astana had become subdued, the average tone of voice a whisper. Lord Yuna and his assistants were holed up in Astana Base, which reassured no one, and even the recent repair of the Causeway was seen by many as a gate to foreign invasion. At least they still said good day to soldiers on duty.

"Yes, that's my point. When we were at war we still had 'em, didn't we?" More watchful silence. "Say, Norris, there's a rumor going around-"

"Spit it out, then."

"They're saying - on the street, I mean, certainly not my opinion -"

"I said, spit it out!"

"I mean… they're saying Lord Yuna's done something to make the gods go away. Him being a thaumaturgist and all."

After a time, he rediscovered his tongue. "I didn't hear that, Pasho."

"I did say it wasn't my opinion."

* * *

When Nina had woken up she'd seen Ryu wearing the gold bell on a cord around his neck. Scias inquired about it at breakfast. 

"This?" Ryu's hand went to the bell, picked it up and gave it a few rattles. "To remind me. That's all."

"There it is," he was calling now, as he indicated the entrance to the Sanctum.

"We're making good time," said Cray. "We should get to the village before nightfall."

They walked through in a rough formation. Ryu and Cray led, Ershin and Scias took the rear, and Nina walked sandwiched between the two rows. She held back a shudder when she entered. She had never liked caves; few in Wyndia did. At least the Sonne Sanctum wasn't as twisted and mazy as some of those she had encountered on their journey. It was mainly a place to pass through, half-holding your breath and listening to the beat of the group's footsteps.

As they moved further in the colors reverse-faded, growing deeper and darker. Cray's straw-colored and Ryu's blue hair became the same in shadow, the only differences in color hinted at by the glow of her staff. The last time they had come through Ursula lit the way by aiming sparkler fire into the ceiling at intervals, though she had stopped when Scias questioned the stability of the cave ceilings after being shot at repeatedly. Instead she used her incendiary magic to create a small flame that hovered before them - a kind of woodless torch. Now that Ursula was back in Chedo and Deis's magic was lost, that comfort had gone. Periodically she glanced back, convinced something followed. Once she caught Scias and Ershin doing the same.

As they rounded a corner one set of feet abruptly sped, and as it did those of everyone else stopped. Nina quickly ruled out Ershin and Scias, as neither had passed her, and Cray's shout of "Hey! Ryu! What the -" confirmed it. As if on a signal, the beat began again, sped up to match Ryu's pace, and they burst out onto the other side of the Sanctum in a jumble.

Nina wasn't sure what she had expected to see, but she knew she hadn't expected Ryu to be standing there, trembling and staring at a patch of grass, utterly alone.

"I told it to stop," he said as he looked up at Nina. "'Hold. Enow.' That means stop, doesn't it? Maybe it didn't understand me."

"What? What didn't? Ryu, what's the matter?"

"The stone in front -" He gestured at the entrance. "It said you had to have a sacrifice to get in. But that was just talk, wasn't it? Typical mystic jabber. I could've blown it out of the way, like the one in Mt. Yogy."

Nina glanced around at the others; Scias and Cray shrugged with their eyes wide (at least, she assumed Scias would be if she could see them) and Ershin said, "Deis says do not ask her."

"But it kept on running and slamming and _slamming _and _slamming_ and then the stone was out of the way and it fell over and the bloody head oh so much blood… I defeated it, you know. Before it happened. It was so tall -" Here he waved a hand vaguely in midair. "Scared the villagers. And after I did it shrunk, got to be a baby again." This time his hand moved around knee level. "Only a baby. A baby killed itself for me. Should I be flattered?"

"Ryu?" she tried again. "I'm sorry - don't know what you mean."

He blinked rapidly. "Don't know?"

"I don't-" She swallowed. "I don't remember anything like that happening when we were here. Nothing like that."

"I… I d-don't remember anything l-like that either," Scias offered.

Cray shook his head. "Neither do I."

"Deis says she does not recall this incident."

Ryu looked at the grass, then back at her. "It didn't happen - not to me. Did it? Then it happened to… Fou-Lu…"

The group looked about. First at each other, then a quick glance at him, then back at each other again, scrambling for words. In the trees birds called.

"Okay, then," said Ryu. "Let's get to Sonne." He stood straight, chin up, but Nina couldn't help but think that it was far too rigid for true confidence. "I'm looking forward to it." His sword hand still trembled.

* * *

"Come in. It's nice to see a new face." 

The stranger whispered thanks and half-tripped over the threshold. He was bleeding from a number of wounds, likely inflicted by the wildlife of the Kasq woods, and the Oracle of Wind found herself supporting him to the carpet - she'd never thought she would have to do such ever since she'd grown old. He flopped onto it like a rag doll, his wings jutting out.

"I don't get many visitors," she said as she bandaged him. "I think you've found out why. May I ask your name?"

"Certainly."

Awkward silence. "Then, what is your name?"

"P'ung Ryong."

"Ah, it's you." She remembered that case. Eager parents had decided the best way to express their hopes for their firstborn was to name him after the Wind Dragon. The child had not been so eager about it once he had been old enough to be teased. He had come to her for guidance, she'd given it, and the last she heard he was a fairly prosperous merchant with three children, none of them a P'ung Ryong, Jr. "It's been a long time."

He smiled. "Verily, it hath been a truly long time, lady Oracle."

"Let me get you something to drink."

He smiled. "Thou'rt too kind, lady Oracle. I thank thee."

She dug up some apple juice, as the teakettle was in hiding, and placed the full cup in his hands. "Are your children doing well?"

For a moment he seemed befuddled, but he rallied. "We didst- I didst hope to discover the condition of the rest after I visited thee, lady Oracle." He took a sip and his eyes widened as if she'd poured him the strongest alcohol. "They hath been away for such a span," he continued after he recovered.

The oldest of his children was ten, and he hadn't spoken in such a way when she had known him. Something was up. "I'm not quite sure I follow."

He clutched the cup of juice. "I, too, lady Oracle, wonder if perhaps thou hast mistaken us - me - for another."

They stared at one another for a moment.

"_P'ung Ryong_?"

The Wind Dragon nodded. "Apologies for my imposition, lady Oracle."

"Oh, do stop it. I thought you'd gone away, with the rest. Tarhn sent a bird."

"Tarhn would be the priestess of the golden plains, would she not?"

"Oh, yes. We keep in touch. Shouldn't you be - well, gone, then?"

"We hath been given mortal bodies by the Yorae Dragon, as there art no longer Endless upon this world and my former body wouldst attract undue attention."

"So it would. You said you're going to Wyndia, if I heard you correctly?"

"Thou hast a differing proposal?"

"Oh, no. It sounds like an excellent idea. I'll come with you. You'll probably need some support if you plan to reveal yourself. And you'll need a weapon to get back through these woods. I'm sure a good stout stick will do in a pinch, and I'm not a bad hand with a wind spell if I do say so myself."

"'Tis fortunate indeed that the Yorae Dragon saw fit to provide raiment as well."

"Yes. Fortunate. Is something wrong with the juice?"

"Nay, lady Oracle. I have simply become unaccustomed to such drink."

"Ah. Well, until you get accustomed again, I suppose you'd better stay away from the strong stuff."

He choked. "This - this is _weak_?"

* * *

It was a one-room house, separated from the rest of Astana Base by a passage through underhalls swarmed with a thousand flies and then up what had once been a long stairway but was now packed with rotting meat that had once been the organs of an Endless. The smell drove most of the assistants away; the prospect of climbing up through the stuff drove away the rest. Someday it would have to be cleared out, but until then everyone was staying away from it in favor of the new project. 

This was fine with Yuna, as it afforded him quiet and he could bypass it all with some simple teleportation.

The Woren had been neat if nothing else. The half of her body that still resembled what she had been was severed from the rest, leaving a slash in the white sheet from the blade of Dragonslayer, and the entire job was covered with the blanket that Yuna had removed before his hasty retreat from the enraged Woren. He had pulled it back up to observe, and after he had taken the samples and disposed of the modified half had spread it out from her neck to where stumps poked out from under it.

She was protected from all decay; her wide-open eyes, though blank, lacked the glaze of death. Even dead Endless never rotted; they only burned, or were perhaps taken apart for good luck charms. Yuna had observed this phenomenon on his first posthumous visit; it had given him satisfaction to know that his creation mimicked the original Endless in this aspect. He frowned at it now. What did this mean now that the Endless had been cast out, and their powers with them? And what did it mean when one considered the chamber packed full of decaying organs, which he had passed by?

He remembered seeing, the first and till now last visit, that the cutoff had been at the waist - the last point visually unaffected by the transformations. So there would, logically, be no stumps to show. Unless they had grown. Yuna reached for the illogical things; his hand was stopped a half-inch away. A barrier. Very sensible measure for healing magics - it kept people from poking their fingers in or some fool thing and getting stuck in the regenerating flesh.

_Regenerating_ flesh…?

He pulled back the blanket. He'd cut out pieces of bone and tissue for analysis by some of his assistants; now the cuts had all vanished. He looked again at her eyes, still wide and clear. He held his hand over her face, felt a slight tickle of exhaled breath, and understood.

"Well!"

Yuna sat down and began to note this latest development.


	3. A Mistaken Identity

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Again, thanks for the reviews. Additional notes are at the end of the chapter.

Chapter Three: A Mistaken Identity

They made good time and they did, indeed, reach Sonne before nightfall, passing a group of returning refugees on the way.

"I w-wonder if that m-man's still there."

Ryu turned to face Scias. "What man?"

Nina explained. The last time they had passed through, there had been a man standing in front of a house at the other end of the village; he had stayed there throughout their visit. "Remember him?"

"I think so. Wonder what he was doing."

"Probably some lovesick twit…"

"Says Deis."

The Endless might have gone and the head been cut off the Empire, but Sonne felt so serene that Ryu thought he might have inadvertently stepped backward in time. On their previous visit it had been somewhat disturbed by the refugees from Chedo, but now that those people were gone, the prevailing calm was ruffled only by their arrival.

As they headed into the village proper the others veered off to bargain for supplies. Ryu headed onward, reviewing each part of the village.

Last time an old man had asked him if he fished. Ryu had replied in the affirmative and they'd had quite an interesting conversation, if you were interested in fish; now when he saw the old man he remembered a denial, and the old man saying that he hadn't looked the type. A small child played on the path outside his house - last time he had mistaken Ryu for someone else. Now Ryu knew who that someone else was, and he also remembered the knowing chirp - _"I know you! My mom says you're the fella that's shackin' up with Mami!"_ Whereupon the child had tipped his head and wondered, _"What's shackin' up mean, anyway?"_

A number had been surprised the first time (or was it really the second? No, the first) he had come to Sonne, mistaken him for that someone else. Now they were surprised all over again. He saw them lifting their heads as he approached, looking about. Eventually their gaze caught on him, and then they would shake their heads and return to their prior activity.

Ryu looked down at the bell hung around his neck, Mami's bell; he watched it bounce lightly off his chest and jingle again as it did.

_But of course. That's it. For a moment they think it's her. _

He almost laughed.

And there - there was Mami's house, or what had been her house, at the other end of the village, with the man standing in front as before, shoulders hunched - waiting for his ladylove to emerge? Now he wasn't so sure. There would be an impressive crack in the back wall, near the oven, large enough for a man to squeeze through - had it been repaired by now?

They hadn't gone near last time, they'd had no business going there. But when he drew close enough, he could see the man was muttering. Nearer, and he heard a one-sided argument.

"It… ain't me fault."

He didn't know the back of the man, but he knew the voice. The man had blocked the path out of the village, begun to interrogate him. Mami came to his rescue, calling him Ryong, a fitting name. Her cousin Ryong, stationed in Kyoin, who'd bumped his head so just answer any funny questions he asks, okay? And then quickly guiding him back to her house for more rest. There he had found out the man was the landlord of Sonne.

The man continued. "It's yer fault, Mami…" He trailed off and paused, as if listening to her response. "Ye shouldn'ta done that…"

He had climbed down Mt. Yogy and the man had been there with Mami. The man had been on the verge of lunging at and attempting to throttle him, demanding to know what he had done to the false Endless that lived in the volcano, asking again who he was, what he was.

The next day he had left Mami's house to see the man approaching, with Imperial soldiers and General Yohm close behind. He had reentered, trapped. Mami, realizing the danger, had run to him, shoved past the group assembled in front of her house and blocked the way long enough for him to get out through the crack in the back wall. The last time he had seen her she was pressed against the shaking door and smiling. Smiling because she'd never thought that crack could be put to such good use.

Ryu took a step forward and reached out, for a moment aiming to grab the man's neck from behind and snap it, or even venture strangulation. But people did things they regretted, in the heat of the moment. He didn't want to leave the others with the burden of breaking him out and hiding him, for who knew how long. Besides, there were things to be said.

As he pulled back the bell jingled and the man spun.

"Wha - wha - Mami - You again! What be ye doing here?"

He glanced sideways. The villagers just coming in from the fields had all stopped to gape, as had the old man and the child. Nina looked up from her discussion with a woman carrying a basket of beans and ran towards the scene, her wings arched and stiff. "Ryu! What is it? What happened?"

The man jabbed a finger at Ryu. "Ye know him? Ye know he-"

She shoved in between them and faced the man, holding out her arms. "I think… I think there's been a misunderstanding. He's not who you think he is, I'm sure of it! You haven't met him before, have you, Ryu?"

He blinked and craned around her for another look at Ryu. "… ye be right, miss -"

Ryu tapped Nina on the shoulder. When she turned he mouthed, "I'm sorry" and stepped past her. As he did the man stepped back and came up against the front wall of Mami's house. Ryu took hold of his wrists and gently lifted them before his face. He felt his mouth open and heard words come through. "Thou wert correct the first time. We hath met before. And I hath returned." Fou-Lu's words again, they must be. He never talked like that.

"What be ye…" _I'd like to know that myself. _

"But! Thou wert in error regarding another matter."

He hadn't noticed the sounds of the village until they ceased. Fou-Lu's words shot into the silent air like gunfire and dissipated slowly. Soon more of them followed.  
"'Twas no fault of hers."

Nina murmured something inaudible behind him, and he turned for a moment to stare at his sudden audience. Cray and Scias and Ershin were coming toward him now, just as confused as she was. Whispering and satisfied-looking nodding began among the watching villagers.

He turned back to the man. "Fault doth lie with thee, as it doth lie with me, and it doth lie with others who hath a hand in her demise." Despite the whispering his voice seemed just as loud as before and as he spoke the whispering and the nodding stopped. "But not her." The whispering began again as he released the man's wrists. "Never her."

He turned toward Nina as the man struggled for words. For once Ryu could sympathize; in speaking for himself, Fou-Lu seemed to have drained all of Ryu's own speaking capability. "I'll be just a minute," he managed before he stepped into the house. Same pair of sleeping mats, one of them mussed. Same table, and cooking things still hanging on the wall. Same crack in the wall.

As he stood there, the man found his words. "Tha- around his neck there -"

Ryu touched the bell, still dangling from the cord, and as he did he fought the memories.

* * *

Nina blinked at the words. "The bell? What about it?"

There was a moment of glancing about and blinking, and the crowd galvanized. Someone cried out, "Ah! Sir, ye ought to have a lie-down!"

The man Ryu had confronted (but had it been Ryu?) shook his head. "Nah, I-"

"Ye should not be out all day and night without even a proper meal!"

One of the women propelled him towards another house. "I got rice balls done for the people from the capital. I got some left, ye must try one. Ye must have at least a taste!"

As the door closed behind the pair the talking truly started.

"Mami had one just like it," said the woman she had been bargaining with. "But not round her neck. Strung it on a ribbon an' wore it in her hair." 

"Got it special all the way from the capital, she did."

"One a' her only vanities, that girl."

An old man raised his eyes with a nostalgic expression. "Lovely thing to hear in the mornings, her walkin' about with that jingly bell."

Nina nodded. "Excuse me, but who's Mami? What happened to her?"

"Great girl."

"So sweet."

"Worked so hard! More'n the _boys_." A number of the men shuffled and mumbled in reply.

"Ye see, she took in a man what got hurt something fierce."

"Did he have very fair hair?" Nina asked. "A bit long, for a man? And green eyes?"

"Oh, aye, that he did."

"She said he was her cousin, Ryong-"

"-but ain't nobody wi' a brain who believed a word of it."

"They were shackin' up, didn't do much in the way of hiding it at-all."

"Mom! What's shackin' up?"

"Never ye mind."

"Going on about 'involving' right in the middle of the fields, they were."

"When he got better he got rid of a big boar what was trampling about in the forest."

"An' then he went and kilt the god in Mt. Yogy."

"Gods don' die, that be what makes 'em gods."

"Whatever ye say, but he kilt it an' the landlord weren't happy about it."

"He got up to Kwanso and talked to one of them big Army people. General - what was it again?"

"Yang."

"No, Yohm."

"Yes, that was it, General Yohm."

"Turned out that he weren't her Cousin Ryong-"

"Of course he weren't her Cousin Ryong!"

"Anyhow, he was a wanted man! Important secret Army matters, they said. They came here to arrest him."

"An' Mami helped him get away, so they took her off to Astana."

"Haven't heard of her since."

"And I guess she still be locked up there now."

"For aiding and abetting."

"That's terrible," said Nina. And as she said this a truly terrible thought assembled itself.

_Ryu said they aimed the hex on that forest at Fou-Lu. Hexes are stronger the more of a relationship you have with the target - that's why Yuna tried to use my sister, for stronger hexes on Alliance countries. This Mami - she was 'involved' with Fou-Lu, and they took her to Astana, where she was never heard from again._

Astana's where the Carronade is. 

"He said 'demise,'" said one of the villagers, as though he'd been listening in on the words in her head. "That mean… that mean Mami's died, then?"

Nina thought she would be sick. "It… looks like it." A wave of horrified gasps swept the crowd, which quickly broke up into whispering knots and wandered away.

Soon after, Ryu emerged from the house. "Um… I…"

"Ryu." Nina took his hands. "Are you all right now?"

"I was always all right." _That's not true_. "But I think we'd better talk. All of us."

"Yes," she said, "I think we'd better."

"Deis says she believes so as well."

Scias nodded. "B-better be s-somewhere out of t-town."

"Yeah." Cray tilted his head upward. "Look, the sun's setting already. Let's make camp, have some of those vegetables we picked up. Then we'll get started."

Ryu nodded. "Okay. Let's get to it."

* * *

He had come to his decision quickly. Considering recent events, he was hardly welcome in the vicinity of Chedo. He might as well shadow his master. Who knew what perils that had been easily surmounted before might bring down a mortal? And it was good to be out in the open again.

A-Tur watched with interest from the shield of a stand of trees as the group left the village and began to set up a tent.

* * *

MORE NOTES: Okay, as you might have guessed, still keenly appreciate all reviews, especially those with advice on archaic speech, Scias's stutter, and the Sonne dialect-thingy. Thanks.  



	4. Fragmented Infinity

Chapter Four: Fragmented Infinity

"Fou-Lu is still here." This would perhaps win awards for obvious statement of the year, but it had to be gotten out of the way. Nods from the half-ring around the campfire, watching him stand before them. They didn't mind the obvious, as long as he followed it up with something of import. "But sooner or later," said Ryu, "I doubt he will be." That got their attention. "Deis? Can you explain?" He'd had a quick conversation with her while they were making camp, just to be certain his fears had a legitimate foundation.

"Sometimes you get constructs - you might call them child minds, they're made specifically to hold apart from the one they came from. But when you've got two actually different minds in there, not a construct, if they've got much in common they can't coexist for too long. They might hold out for a month or six, but sooner or later something happens."

A half-ring of silence around the campfire. _What happens? _drifted in the air, unspoken. Deis picked up the question. "They start flowing into each other. Letting slip memories and feelings and traits and whatnot. Then you can't tell them apart, and then they are one mind. That kid in Chek told me, when I wondered why she was so standoffish."

"Says Deis."

Cray frowned. "So how did you last so long in that armor?"

"Simple. It was built in to avoid it from the start. You can't have armor operators taking on the emotions of their armor or some such thing. And we're so different-" Nods of agreement. "-there's not so much exchange. But if Ryu and Fou-Lu were alike enough to reunite, they'll have some problems."

"Says Deis."

* * *

_I am also Fou-Lu.  
Fou-Lu is still here. _

Nina pressed her hands to her collarbone and spoke. "Since Ryu's remembering Fou-Lu's memories, and Fou-Lu… talked through him in the village, does that mean it's already started?"

"Deis says it certainly sounds like it, though if Fou-Lu is still speaking for himself it means that merging will probably be delayed."

Ryu said, "It's a good thing, isn't it? That he's speaking for himself."

"Deis says that if you do not wish to merge, it is good."

Cray said, "But if the two of you are supposed to be one… then wouldn't it be…"

"Wouldn't it be good if we got together again? Yes." Ryu shook his head. "Only, we're not one. Not anymore. He remembers that girl with the bell in Sonne, someone I never met and he remembers being in love with her. How can we be one person if one bit of us remembers loving someone and the other bit doesn't?

"Maybe this could've worked out hundreds of years ago, back when it'd just happened, but now - if we merge minds now, someone's going to give, someone's going to lose himself… and… it'll probably be Fou-Lu."

"W-what can we d-do t-to stop it?"

Ryu sat down and bent his head forward. "That's just it, Scias. I don't know." 

Nina leaned toward him. "Don't you have any idea?"

"Well, one, maybe. But it's a bit-"

"One's better than none. Please, tell us."

"Umm. I was thinking, maybe if we got separate bodies, like it was before…" He cupped the bell in his hand and stared at it. "I mean, now that the powers of the Endless are gone, we don't need to be together for our full power, because that power's not there anymore. So why not split?"

"Deis says, that is a good point."

"But we'd probably just start wanting to be together all over again. And anyway, how could we do it? Like I said, we haven't got powers anymore, so how do we do it? I've got no idea about that bit."

"No idea?"

He looked up at her. "Absolutely none."

Nina wished they had started on this before eating. As it was, there was no convenient silverware to scrape around a plate, no cups to clink together, nothing to chew, no "pass the sweetfish," nothing but the normal sounds of the night, which served only to call attention to their own silence.

Then, "Deis says what about Yuna?"

Cray punched his fist into his other hand. "What about that bastard?"

"He was studying up on us Endless, right? For the wrong reasons maybe, but he'll likely have written up his experiments, and some of that might actually have something useful. And there was something I wanted to look up."

"Says Deis."

_I see. She wants another body. Has all this talk about Ryu and Fou-Lu made her worry about maybe merging with Ershin? Not necessarily. I know I'd want another one too, after so long. _

"And if we h-happen to find_ h-him_ then…" Scias trailed off and looked at Cray.

Fist into hand. Nina winced at the sound. "Then I'll kill him."

"She says, 'We'll be cheering you on as you do. What do you say, Ryu?'"

Ryu looked at Ershin, then at Nina. "I don't know… using what he got from his experiments… who knows how much he got wrong?" The accuracy of the information was obviously the least of his worries.

She looked back and nodded. "Couldn't we… I don't know, couldn't we just ask the Abbess about it or- well, something. Something that's not that."

"You two might care about where it comes from, but I don't. Astana's on the way back, in any case, and it wouldn't hurt to have a look. Look, when we've got the papers - or not, as the case may be - we can get a second opinion in Chek, okay?"

"Says Deis."

"I don't give a damn about his papers," said Cray. "What I give a damn about is his neck."

It hit her. "And Elina…"

"Yes. Her." Ryu shook his head. "We can't very well let him get away with what he did to her."

"_I'm_ not going to let him!"

He nodded. "Me neither, Cray. Count me in."

"Oh! You're right, but I was thinking that we should try and bring her… we should bring her home - to Wyndia. For… you know. For…"

"Burial?" Ryu nodded again. "Yes. Let's do that."

"I… I think it's a g-good thing to d-do."

"Yeah." Cray released his fist and rested his chin in his hand. "We should do that, too."

Ryu said, "We should do all of it except for maybe the using his papers part."

Ershin swiveled about. "Deis says that sounds like a good course of action." Pause. "She also says that until a solution to the problem is found, Ryu should try to block out Fou-Lu's memories."

"I'll do that." Ryu looked around. "Let's all get to sleep."

* * *

A-Tur listened to their conversation and stifled a number of monstrous yawns. Their words were intriguing, to be certain, and he'd taken note of them and worried for his master, but he was tired - at least, this was what he believed it be, as he had never experienced it in all his centuries of guarding the Imperial Castle. But he had witnessed tiredness in mortals from time to time, and it was often accompanied by his symptoms.

This was the second night he was in this state. Was it something to do with the vanishing of his master's powers, which had removed his sleeplessness? Would he next begin to require food? He would have to ask this, when he revealed himself.

But it wouldn't be for a while, he didn't think. Surprise was an excellent tool. And until then he half-slept, ready for the sounds of danger or breaking camp.

* * *

Ryu woke in the middle of dream that reproduced a confrontation with a false Endless. Once he realized whose memory it was drawn from - partly due to the absence of his friends, partly due to his telltale manner of speech during - he groaned and placed his face in his hands as he sat in the tent. Blocking out memories that resided in your own head was like trying to hold back a flood with a sieve. 

He tried speaking to Fou-Lu again, whispering so as not to wake the others. There was no response - could he even hear what he was saying?

Ryu sat with his eyes wide open and thought of jumping down the cliffs near Sarai to save Nina, who hadn't needed to be saved. He thought of the mischievous faeries of the Wychwood. He thought of sliding down a waterfall on a log raft with Nina clinging to him and Scias grinning his teeth-baring grin. He grabbed at any memory he could, except for what had anything to do with Fou-Lu.

* * *

The barrier prevented him from taking more samples from the regenerated area, but he could observe well enough, and do some basic reflex testing and the like. Once he had observed and tested and confirmed that she was, indeed, alive but unresponsive, there was not much else to be done, besides observe the same state some more. Still, it was an unprecedented event in the recorded history of the Empire, if one didn't count the First Emperor's long rest, and Yuna was drawn away reluctantly when a frantic assistant finally took the step of swimming halfway through the organ chamber and screaming for him.

There seemed to have been a spate of misplaced papers and contaminated cell cultures in his absence; setting it right was long and tedious and he didn't return to the room until dawn of the next day.

* * *

Elina lay on the bed as before and stared up at the ceiling; over time, for lack of other things to do, she'd memorized every fissure in the plaster. It had surprised her back then, how banal everything could become when given time.

As she moved her lips, choked sounds emerged. She tried again, and again, until she heard what she recognized as her own voice. Cracked and hoarse, but still her own. "I… I'm… supposed… to be… dead." The next sentence came faster, as she remembered the workings of her tongue.

"I'm not coming back, not for even more of it."

_But I'm already back._

She remembered being pulled away - though away from what she no longer knew - and she still felt the gate in her mind. It was sealing, eradicating itself, but before it did nothing stopped her from running back through it. _Then, I'm going back._

* * *

When he returned he was carrying a refilled pitcher of water and a stack of boxes of cheap shisu that had been pressed upon him. Irritated as he was by the lengthy interruption, he had declined to tell his assistants his reasons for staying in the room so long, and they likely chalked it up as another one of "Lord Yuna's little idiosyncrasies" - they hadn't known he was in the room when they used that phrase, and he hadn't cared to enlighten them to that fact either.

She was still and silent and blank-eyed as before. Yuna sat her up, poured a cup of water and put it in her hands. "Drink it." She did so. This convinced him that she was well and truly gone, leaving only memorized reaction - were she aware she would have put up at least token resistance. He then took apart a few of the shisu and guided her through the process of swallowing before he went to get the necessary medical equipment. It would be a fine thing for her to be retrieved from the dead by whatever cause and then killed of thirst and starvation before anything but a few notes in a log came of it. 


	5. On the Move

Chapter Five: On the Move

So. This was what Wyndia had become. P'ung Ryong couldn't help but gawk as if he was simple - and in a way, he was. He had seen it transform from up in the clouds, to be sure, but he had never come down to experience the results of the transformations.

Their wings were so small now, bordering on vestigial, and he felt strange with a pair of them attached. To be sure, if he was to be mortal he had wanted to be one of his people, but somehow he had still expected great wings as they were centuries ago, nearly sweeping the ground, wings that would never fit through the doors of a number of these new buildings. But the Yorae Dragon, or the part of him that was in control, was young; he would not remember days when the Wyndians had no need for the device on the roof of the Tower of Wind and simply flew up to see him.

The pavement of the street was a pattern of jade-green tiles, and when his gaze had swept the entire city twice, he occupied himself with that. As he looked and walked the Oracle stopped frequently to give and receive greetings. "Hello, Dana. Morning, Caleb. Good day, Momo. How are things?" When they asked her for an explanation as to what had happened not so long ago, she told them that she must first inform the king. When they asked for P'ung Ryong's identity, as was inevitable, she told them he was an important visitor and left it at that, while he clamped his tongue between his teeth in case he got the urge to shout to all of Wyndia who he was. No. Who he had been. 

When they neared the castle a pair of guards rushed out. "Oracle of Wind?" one of them cried. "Thank goodness, you've arrived! The king would speak with you - ah, if it's not too much trouble."

"Yes. I would speak with him as well." She tipped her head in P'ung Ryong's direction. "But he comes with me."

The guard stared at him for a moment before he rallied. "But of course, Oracle."

"I canst not carry this out," he whispered in the lift.

"You most certainly can," she whispered back. "You need to tell the king what's come to pass. Wasn't that what you meant to do all along?"

He clung to the lift railing and leaned over. "Perhaps so. Nevertheless-"

"Nevertheless, nothing. And if you must be sick, try and aim away from the people down there."

He gave her a sour look and turned away, tempted to vomit into the lift instead. 

When the lift stopped he paused for a time, getting his digestive system back in order and trying to look like he was only appreciating the view before following the Oracle and their escorts to the throne room.

P'ung Ryong had lived for centuries, kept natural disaster from Wyndia for nearly as long, had even engineered the downfall of one absurdly corrupt ruler when he was far younger and rasher, but as he entered he envisioned denunciation, a severed head on a pike. _How can he have been the Wind Dragon? Our Wind Dragon? He was beaten into the ground by forest creatures, he nearly threw up in the lift to the castle and he follows around his Oracle without saying a word for himself! _

The current king had stood up and greeted the Oracle, who curtsied, rather clumsily, though he didn't seem to notice or mind. Now they turned and nodded in his direction. He walked toward them because he could not think what else to do. Halfway, his knees began to fail, and a few steps away they gave out completely. He caught himself by his hands. "Majesty," he said, and stopped, unsure of how to proceed. He heard the Oracle step in.

"Your Majesty, this is P'ung Ryong, who was once the Wind Dragon."

* * *

Tarhn grabbed the handle and yanked it toward her; the layout of the maze of laser beams changed yet again. "There. That's done."

Ch'o Ryong looked on with interest. "Dost thou pass through often?"

She shrugged. "I used to go through here to Wyndia all the time before I had Cray. Now… not so much."

"I hadst not expected such a bewildering puzzle in our path."

"It's funny, I always thought you were the one to put it in. But I guess not. I think it's rather interesting if you remember to keep out of the way of the lasers."

"I suppose mine priestesses hath a strange bent of humor." Ch'o Ryong, thoroughly mystified, changed the subject. "So thou hast been living on the plains since thine husband's death? Art thou not wanted in thy place of birth? In…" She paused as she recalled the two syllables. "… Worent?"

"Oh, I'm wanted." They set off through the path delineated by the laser beams. "It's just I'm sure Cray'd rather not have his old mother around."

"Why wouldst thy child not prefer to 'have around' that which gave him life? Dost thou… have disagreements?"

"Not severe ones. But really, can you imagine what it would have been like, being Chief of Worent and having his mother forgetting that and reminding him to eat his broccoli in the middle of talking with the Elders - or worse, Alliance diplomats?" She laughed. "They'd never hear the end of it in Ludia." 

Ch'o Ryong paused and duly imagined it. "'Twould be a humiliation?"

"Exactly."

They left the shrine and walked north, toward the Fen and Wyndia.

* * *

"Ah. It's you."

Ryu nodded. "We've done what we… what we went to do, and I wanted to say thank you, Bunyan. Your training helped a lot."

Bunyan shook his head. "Don't mention it. I'm glad to do what I can."

While they talked, Nina stared upward. They had first met Bunyan when they became lost in the foothills south of Kwanso and stumbled onto his hut. He had given them a place for the night and directions to Chedo, as well as consented to train them in some of the techniques he had picked up in the Imperial army.

As she turned round idly to examine the clouds in the other half of the sky Ryu blurted, "But… I haven't repaid you for your earlier ministrations."

Bunyan looked surprised and Ryu even more so. They both recovered quickly, and Bunyan lifted an eyebrow. "I wouldn't call them ministrations, exactly."

"I mean - you see, I caught up with my brother in Chedo, we talked, and he said you'd helped him out after he was injured. He fell off a bridge, or something, washed up on a riverbank, and you found him, he said." Ryu paused and added, "His name's Fou-Lu. Does that sound familiar?"

Bunyan nodded thoughtfully. "Yeah… I remember him. I remember thinking it was an interesting name. Same as the First Emperor, you know."

"I know."

"He brought a good deal of excitement with him."

"Excitement? How do you mean?"

Bunyan leaned forward; his voice lowered but Nina still heard it. "A bit after he'd gone I got a visit from one of the generals. Yohm, I think it was. He told me your brother was a wanted man. Top-secret army matters, he said, but I pushed him about it, and he mentioned usurping and desecrating the First Emperor's tomb."

"Usurping and desecrating?"

"Mm-hm. That last I thought was strange, considering his name. Though I thought for a while he'd given me a fake one. But it's not a fake, is it?"

"No."

"They had soldiers stationed up here for a week before they decided he wouldn't be coming back."

"Er, yeah, about all that…" Ryu looked down. "It turned out to be a misunderstanding. So please don't think he's a - a criminal or anything."

"A misunderstanding, eh? I see."

"Thank you. One question."

"Go on."

"Did you see any dragons around at the time?" 

"Well, come to think of it, I did. Flying southward, I think, and then one of those new creatures the army uses took off after it. You think that's got something to do with your brother, then?"

"Yes, probably."

"You must have an interesting family."

Ryu cracked a slight smile. "You have no idea. Thanks again, and if there's anything I can ever do for you-"

"I'm doing fine. You take care of yourselves."

"We will. But if you ever need us for anything, anything at all, just ask."

"Oh, I will if you're in the area." Nina got the distinct impression he was only saying it to appease Ryu. "Good luck."

"Same to you." They shook hands.

Ryu didn't start laughing until after the hut was out of sight.

"Nothing I can do for him," he said in between harsh yowls. "Nothing I can give him. He's happy the way he is. I can't even promise to be there for him or anything. All I can do is say thank you."

She clasped his hands between hers. "Please, Ryu, don't worry about it." 

He stopped laughing and stared at her. "I just want to be able to repay him. Is that so much to ask?"

* * *

One of the newer recruits stared out the window. "Sergeant sir, there's a crowd gathered up near our station. What should I do about it?"

Norris groaned. It was all well and good for General Rhun to have made a point of remembering all his soldiers' names and being constantly fair and courteous, but a week spent attempting to train this young man would have had even him looking for a height to fling himself off. "Oh, I don't know, maybe you could offer to give them a guided tour of the Carronade?"

The sentry gaped at him in horror. "But the Carronade is a secure military-"

"Private, go get yourself a sarcasm detector and don't come back until then."

"Understood, sir." The sentry opened the door and marched out. As the door closed Norris caught a sudden rush of angry muttering. Someone called out, "You bunch of lousy-"

"How's things?" asked Pasho as he came up the stairs. In response, Norris reopened the door and peered out. Pasho joined him.

Someone in the robes of an Imperial Thaumaturgist stood on a platform of crates, being observed and listened to by what seemed to be half or more of the population of Astana, none of who were throwing things. Considering the apparent content of his speech, this was not good. Heads in the crowd were still turning to glare at the soldier as he passed by on his quest for a sarcasm detector.

"- and for what have they seen fit to sacrifice one of our citizens? For a well-deserved blow against, let us say, Ludia, or indeed any country of the Eastern Alliance at all? No - a hex was fired against the Soma Forest, less than two day's journey from the Imperial Capital! Clearly it was a place swarming with enemy influence." Even the just-departed sentry would be hard put to miss the sarcasm that dripped from the speaker's words.

"Eh," said Pasho. "That's not good. I know him, I think. One of Lord Yuna's assistants. You think he's out for a walk?"

"One hell of a walk." Norris turned to the remaining sentries, who hastily saluted. "Get everyone together, we've a brewing riot to squelch." _Hex on Soma Forest? If it's true I've got to wonder what for. But this is hardly a time to get everyone angry!_

The speaker's voice climbed. "I'm sure you're all wondering who is at fault for this. The answer - Lord Yuna, the Minister of Thaumaturgy." Cue not-very-surprised muttering. "Once I served him with gratitude for the privilege, but those days have long passed. It is he who so disgusted the gods that they abandoned us! He even created a weapon specifically for the killing of them! And he confided to us that now that the true gods are gone, he can create as many false ones as he wishes!

"And his crimes do not stop there! He also arranged to bring Alliance royalty into the Empire in the guise of a sacrifice for the Carronade and then transformed said royalty into one of his false gods! Were it not for the expeditious action of Captain Ursula-" Norris began grinding his molars to stubs. How _dare_ he drag the Captain's name through his mud? "-his monstrosity might even now be the Alliance's newest weapon! The traitor!"

Norris glanced behind him. A reasonable troop had been assembled, some with their boots on the wrong feet, some rubbing their eyes, and a single unfortunate with his armor on backwards. It would have to do.

"I have done what I could to sabotage his newest foul project before leaving the Base. But now - I must beseech you, good people of Astana, for your help to truly put an end to this treacherous madman and his schemes! For now that the Emperor is gone and the army laid low, who else but the people can stand against him?"

Norris opened the door and marched outside, quickly followed by Pasho and the other soldiers. He gestured with his pike. "All right, this's gone on long enough. Break it up."

From the looks trained on him as effectively as any firearm, it seemed the people weren't interested. Before him the speaker lifted his arms and began to chant, and behind him he could hear the frantic exchanges of the city boys.

"That pipsqueak over there with the blue bobble hat's my brother! What in the name of the First Emperor's he doing here? I'm gonna kill Mom, letting him run about like this!"

"Isn't that your mom standing next to him? Her with the knitting?"

"Hey, there's Celia! Why's she listening to subversy types? And I thought we were getting off so good together!"

"I told you! I told you she went to meetings, and you just said she was a free spirit!"

"Now, all of you," Norris began. "You're disturbing the peace. You all step on home and you won't be-" The incendiary magic went off inches before his eyes; he jumped back and managed to save his eyebrows. The speaker lowered his arms; it was impossible to discern an expression with the cloth fastened over his face, but Norris would have bet his last zenny he was smirking behind the cloth. "All right then, it looks like we'll have to stop with the politeness." He looked over the troop. "Disperse these people. _Is there something wrong, Privates_?"

One of them shifted from foot to mis-shoed foot. "Er, I don't know about that, Sergeant. Didn't think this job called for putting weapons to civilians."

"Don't get me wrong, Sergeant," said another. "I'm no traitor but I'm not piking my brother."

The speaker continued. His voice retained its furious tone and did not evince that he was likely grinning ear to ear. "First, we shall take over the Carronade! Until we can be sure it shall not be used against our Empire, it shall not be used again! To the Carronade!"

A thing with a hundred voices roared back, "To the Carronade!"

Pasho tapped Norris on the shoulder. "Shall we run for our lives?"

Norris prepared a scathing retort - something involving an assertion of the might of the Imperial Army - but the sight of massed angry civilians standing before him and the thought of semi-mutinous soldiers - with relatives and sweethearts among the aforementioned massed angry civilians - standing behind him gave him pause long enough to give the proposal due consideration. "Yes," he said at last. "Let's."


	6. Unwanted Remembrance

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Question of the week - why haven't there been any reviews for Chapter Five? Thanks.

* * *

Chapter Six: Unwanted Remembrance

As of this morning Ursula was the newest general of the Fou Imperial Army and the only one who was known to be alive. She had expected the promotion for a while, but only halfway; her irrational side had feared that if she truly believed it would happen then fate would ensure that it would not, simply as punishment for her hubris.

During the meeting of what remained of the military high command she pretended she thought it an elaborate joke until at last one of the lieutenants, utterly exasperated, had burst out, "How many times must we repeat this, ma'am? We're entirely serious. You've been carrying the burden of a general for a while now, and this only makes it official. It's not as if there are many other candidates, what with Rasso gone." There had been as usual a wave of guiltily relieved expressions sweeping down each side of the table at the mention of Rasso's premature demise; he had been quite popular with the court at Chedo but not nearly as much with his peers.

She was finally pressed into accepting her new rank, and then all those present had stood and saluted her. General Ursula. That was her title, now, and not just that of her childish dream. Ursula still felt a little thrill and more color entering her face whenever anyone called for her, though she sternly told herself not to let it go too far up in her head.

"General Ursula!"

There it was again. "Captain Tang?"

The new Captain fell into lockstep with her as she began her routine looping throughout the half-repaired streets of Chedo. "General, we just got a report from our me - soldiers in Astana. The Causeway's been fixed. Sergeants Norris and Pasho report civil unrest in the area, possibly due to the apparent departure of the gods. Also, Lord Yuna is as of the time of their report residing in Astana Base with a number of his assistants."

Ursula nodded. "Send a message for him to come here immediately." She didn't think for a minute that he would walk straight into his prison cell, but one had to go through the motions.

She turned in his direction and he saluted without slowing his pace. "Yes, General!"

"All right, any luck with the Purifiers?"

"Er. We've had trouble finding them - most all the hexes have been in Alliance territory until now, so there hasn't been much demand for Purifiers over here."

"Of course. I should have thought of that. Send a small contingent through the Causeway and have them make inquiries. They should give a fair payment for services, carry minimal weaponry and at least try to be polite."

Another salute. "Will do, General!"

She finally asked the question she dreaded. "And the Imperial succession?"

From his expression she gathered he had dreaded it just as much. "We tracked down the third cousin in Chiqua. Looks like he's been dead for a little over a year."

"What was it this time?"

"A boating accident, apparently. From the doctor's report it looks like the boat flipped over, half strangled him, and then bludgeoned him the rest of the way."

"I just hope they took it apart after. A murderous boat is exactly what we don't need. How many left to check?"

"Er. There's his mother. I think."

Now that a new Emperor was needed, it all became so obvious. Just about every one of the late Thirteenth Emperor Soniel's relations that qualified for an entry on his official genealogy was now dead - everything from being trampled by a rampaging Whelk (never mind that Whelks hadn't any feet to trample with) to improperly prepared blowfish. On top of that, he had never married and hadn't even a rumor of an illegitimate child to his name.

She mustn't get frustrated. Maybe some of his relatives had caught on, faked their own deaths before they could be given a true one, and were even now living in hiding, making it a matter of tracking them down. And maybe the First Emperor would re-split from Ryu, march back into Chedo, make himself the Fourteenth as well as the First, and put an end to the suspense.

And he would be welcomed, at that. One of the most surprising things she had encountered during Chedo's reconstruction was how many people who had cursed whoever was responsible for the destruction straight through all the hells ever imagined and out the other side changed their minds when they found out who it had been. Their general attitude seemed to be, "You say it was the First Emperor? Well, he must have had a good reason for it, because he's the First Emperor, after all." She found it somewhat exasperating to see how many otherwise reasonable people promptly turned to putty when the name of Fou-Lu was invoked.

"If nothing else comes up, we'll have to discuss this with the surviving court officials."

He shuddered at the mention of the surviving court officials. "Yes, ma'am."

"But until then, we focus on rebuilding. Understood?"

"Understood, General."

* * *

Near noon they encountered another group of Chedo refugees heading in the opposite direction on the road to Kwanso. They ended up sitting together for a rest and lunch, while the refugees pressed them for news. Ryu told them what he could without mentioning just _who_ had cast out the Endless. Ursula had warned him when they left Chedo that not many would take it well. "The world might not need gods," she'd said, "but a lot of people don't know that."

"I've got to feel sorry for the people who lived in Kwanso to start with," said one. "First there's us, and then they've got a whole bunch of military coming in from Astana. There's been a riot, or something."

Cray looked up. "A riot?"

"Yup. Heard tell that one of Lord Yuna's people didn't agree with what he's been working on and called up a screaming mob. I wouldn't envy Lord Yuna right now."

They looked at each other in silence, and the tentative line of route to Astana Ryu had drawn on his mental map grew thicker and darker.

When Ryu approached the gates of Kwanso he was intercepted by a harried woman. "You're not with the court or something, are you? No? Then, I'm afraid you'll have to sleep outside - we haven't any more room in here, what with all the soldiers. I hope that's all right with you," she said, wearing an expression that spoke for itself - _it had _better _be all right, or it will not go well for you._

"That's fine," Ryu said hastily. "I was wondering if I could talk to someone from Astana? About what happened."

She abruptly smiled. "Certainly. This way." As they passed through the gate, he heard her muttering triumphantly - "Ha! Think they can just show up and bloody well _commandeer_ everything, can they? This'll show 'em!"

When he was introduced to the officer that had been in charge of the Astana soldiery, the latter didn't look up at first. "Ma'am, please," he said as his quill moved across the paper, "I'm in the middle of - !" He jumped up, knocking over the covered jar he had been using as a writing surface. The letter fell to the ground. "We've met before, haven't we? You're Captain Ursula's friend, right?"

"Right. I'm Ryu."

"Sergeant Norris, Imperial Army." He bent down to pick up the letter and cursed as he saw the smudged ink. "How's she doing?"

"Fine, last I saw her. Can you tell me what happened?"

"Sure. One of the thaumaturgists was saying that Lord Yuna was the one who'd made the gods gone, and he was going to make his own, and they should stop him, et cetera." Norris shook his head as he righted the jar and continued the letter. "We tried to break it up, but the thaumaturgist had attack magic. Last I saw they'd taken over the Carronade."

"Oh."

"Say, are you going back to the capital anytime soon? We've got to get our report there."

"Sorry, no."

"Where to?"

"Not that it's any of your business, but home." _With a detour to Astana. _

"Ah. That's too bad." He stared at Ryu. "You're Alliance, right?"

"In a manner of speaking."

"They got the Causeway fixed before it happened - 'course using it's out of the question now, but if we got things settled down, then I don't see why you can't take the quick way back. The thing is…" He grinned tentatively. "We need more firepower to do it. Preferably handled by someone who hasn't got a grandma or anyone else on the other side to get all upset about. Do you know what I'm saying?"

"I think I know."

"Good." He held out his hand.

Ryu didn't take it. "I'll have to talk to the others about this before we can decide." After all, he reasoned, he wasn't saying that he _would_ bring this up with the others, let alone try and persuade them to that course of action.

As it was, he did mention it, discussion ensued, and it was their consensus that they would press on to Astana and decide on their further course of action when they got there. There was, however, some debate about whether they would use the Causeway if or when it was available - it would take less time than a trek northward and a sea voyage, to be sure, but a sandflier was a virtual necessity for the journey from Kyoin to Wyndia, and their sandflier had been left south of Shikk. Votes were taken, and they decided that that decision could wait as well.

Nina approached him afterwards. When they were sitting on the edge of the camp, she said, "I hope when we find Elina's… ah… when we find Elina, I hope it can be open-casket." Her hands flew to her mouth. "I'm sorry! I shouldn't have said that!"

"It's okay. I hope so too."

"I mean - who knows what he did to her… her… you know. Her," she concluded. "You know what I mean, right?"

"Yes. Er." He cast about for something fairly clever but sensitive. As he thought he spotted something promising his mouth was already open and something rather different emerged. "If he has… well, there are people who have businesses fixing people up for that, right? And if he's stupid enough to be around, we can make him do it free of charge, in exchange for Cray not breaking his neck." Once this was out, he instinctively mimicked her hands-to-mouth gesture. Now that it was at a fair distance in his memory, the confrontation with the Sonne landlord made him redden, and this was worse - he couldn't blame it on anyone but himself.

Nina giggled, then quickly became somber. "You're right. I know there're embalmers and things, but…"

_But you're wondering what she'll look like when we find her, because that'll be what you'll remember._ "I'll see if I can get a sheet, and we'll take it with us. Better than that - I'll get the best and biggest quilt they've got. Okay?"

"A quilt? Why?"

"For, uh, a shroud. You know. Because it wouldn't be that practical to haul a… you know, around, and it might be kind of, er, sticky carrying her around directly, so…"

She clapped her hands. "That's a wonderful idea! Thank you, Ryu."

"It was nothing."

"No. It was something."

"No it wasn't."

"Yes it was."

He sighed and relented. "If you say so. Why don't I go get it now?"

"Oh - if you want to, that's a good idea, but…" She tipped her head and, to his horror, Ryu found himself expecting the bell to sound as she did. "I was thinking maybe we could talk a while longer?"

"Sure. That sounds good. Er." _What should I do now? Tell a joke? Try to hug her? Wait for her to do or say something first? And Fou-Lu's memories - you'd think what came before would help, wouldn't it? _He reddened as one of the choicer ones made its presence known. _It's not helping!_

"Er," he tried again. "Nice weather, isn't it?"

She nodded rapidly. "Yes, nice weather."

They sat in silence. Ryu's face grew progressively redder as he fought off all the new images that emerged when he considered what else he could say to her. When he finally spoke, the silence was so thick about them that to break it was an effort. "About the quilt. What color d'you think it should be?"

"I don't know. Maybe patchwork? She was always crazy about patchwork. Once she sewed up this big skirt that was all patchwork, and at least half of it trailed around on the floor when she put it on."

"Really? Half of it?"

"Mm-hm. Only Father and Mother wouldn't let her wear it in public, and then I threw up on it, so she made it into pillowcases, and then -" Ryu listened intently as she elaborated on the tale and laughed at appropriate moments, and when it ended with the disposal of what had by then become patchwork placemats he was sorry it had ended, because it meant silence would settle in once more.

"Say," he said quickly, flinging figurative incendiary magic into the bridge he had just crossed and pushing onward before he could be frozen by embarrassment. "Have you ever heard the one about the Ludian soldier and the Imperial soldier who walked into a bar?"

"No. But you'll tell me, right?"

He told her and she laughed, though he was convinced she laughed not at the joke he'd heard in Shikk but at the way his face had no doubt contorted as he tried to deliver the punch line. Then she told him one of her own, and he laughed as well. They continued like this for some hours.

He was comforted by humor. Of the many memories Ryu had inherited, there was none of Fou-Lu trading jokes with Mami and the bell jingling as she laughed and tossed her head back. This experience at least was his alone.


	7. Pavane

Thanks to aegis for your input. More at the end of this chapter.

* * *

Chapter Seven: Pavane

Ryu was up to his waist in the decayed remains of a giant heart; the straps of his pack dug into his shoulders and the sound of the bell as he moved was for the first time irritating. Behind him Scias and Cray let out staccato puffs of breath that echoed his own. Nina leapt above him with wings beating. As she began to descend she grabbed onto a web of decayed tissue and began to climb toward the light from above. Normally Ryu would have welcomed light as a sign that they would soon be out, but as it was it merely made it harder to ignore what he had been trying to.

He understood now why the people of Astana (he thought they'd been terribly calm, for people who'd supposedly had a riot) had laughed at their declaration of intent to go after Yuna and then offered to sell them nose plugs (_D'you think we haven't already tried?_ one had said). Their leader, an Imperial thaumaturgist, had set up his office in the Carronade facility that had been vacated by the military and vehemently denied that he had provoked any riot (_I assure you_, he said, _no blood whatsoever was shed_), and he had said much the same thing, but in a far more wordy way. Even Yuna's assistants in Astana Base, deprived of their work, had merely given them infuriating smiles and wished them good luck in their travels.

Nina let out a small cry as her handholds gave, and she hovered for a moment before finding others, some way lower. Once his heart had regained its usual rhythm Ryu found that he had flung his arms wide in preparation to catch her. He quickly continued his climb after drawing his sword and cutting his own handhold, then slashing at a giant fly that had come too close for even the minimal comfort that could be obtained while squishing through rotted organs that had once belonged to Nina's sister.

The last time they had been here their path had been blocked by a giant vein, and an apparition of Princess Elina had directed them to seek the Dragonslayer; that particular obstacle was gone now, but there was no longer any pathway for it to block except for the burnt and hacked bits down below, where the people of Astana had made their attempts. The thought seized him that they were trapped here, and they could swim in the rot for the rest of their lives and never get any closer. But that was silly, he'd had the same thought further down and now here he was, wasn't he?

When finally Nina took his hands and pulled him out, he lay flat on his face gasping for a time before he got to his feet and helped her extract the others. Even now the stench insinuated itself with them, instead of being conveniently left behind with its source. Rags were produced and passed around to clean up the clinging filth - it would not do, when confronting Yuna, to be plagued by the smell. Nina had foregone the offered nose plugs but had bought a bottle of strong perfume to dip the cloths in. Soon they were overwhelmed with overripe fruit, in lieu of rotted meat. The quilt he had acquired in Kwanso remained clean and fairly unscented, to his relief, and he returned it to the pack with care.

In Chedo after defeating A-Tur they had seen General Rhun slumped against the wall of the Imperial Castle. What he had said then gained significance when it was compared with those of Fou-Lu's memories that had slipped through before Ryu had realized, and those that continued to gravitate to him despite his best efforts.

_Even if we knew not what we were doing_, he'd said, _we aided him in his pursuit of power... we helped him in his attempt to kill a god..._ "He" had to be Yuna, especially since Rhun had inquired to Ursula about him just before giving the confession. Yohm, too, had mentioned it before making himself a living torch - he remembered that through Fou-Lu. As if doing what he had done to Nina's sister hadn't been enough, it now seemed Yuna had been behind the Empire turning on Fou-Lu - including the hex on Soma Forest and the sacrifice that had powered it.

Now that the cleaning was done with, everyone turned to checking their weaponry. Most of their heavier armor had been left in the safekeeping of the inn - they doubted Yuna could hurt them significantly on his own, but they would probably have to take him out hard and fast before he could escape. Now that he really thought about it, it depressed Ryu how many times Yuna had escaped - from the Imperial Castle, though Fou-Lu, unknowing of the extent he was implicated, had not expended that much effort against him to begin with; in Kwanso when they had sought the Dragonslayer - though, again, they hadn't known how important he had really been; and in this same place. Ryu had been outside, as per Elina's request, but even he had heard Cray's outraged shout and Yuna's protest - _I can create gods! You can't kill me!_ just before he must have made his retreat.  
_  
And he's right. He can run and run forever, and we can run around after him, only a little ways behind him if we're lucky. When he's in danger he doesn't even have to look for a way out like the rest of us, just zap and he's out of it just like that. What with all the time we're taking out here, it would be a wonder if he hasn't caught on and got out already. _

As if his mind had been read, their activities passed with minimal speaking, and when Cray finally said "Let's get this done with, then," it was a half-whisper. They approached the door to the house one at a time, so that the noise of several feet moving all at once would not be risked, and as if on a signal all sounds of breathing ceased. Ryu clutched the bell to muffle the sound and as he did he chanted in his head, _three-two-one-zero. Three-two-one-zero. Three-two-one... _

Then nothing. Ryu craned his neck, trying to look around the corner of the house. He had heard something from the other side. But of course - if Yuna was in there, he wouldn't bother about being quiet, would he?

Cray placed his hand to the door and looked from side to side. Everyone nodded, and Cray nodded back, like some kind of bizarre ceremony. The Opening of the Door.

And then it was open, Cray was through, and everyone piled through after him; it seemed they turned somersaults over one another in their sudden hurry. Somehow Ryu landed on his feet in time to see Cray dash across the room.

Yuna sat beside the massive bed holding a journal and on the bed - no time to look at that, he was turning around, he had to have seen Cray by now, and now Ryu was running as well, shoulder-to-shoulder with Cray and then past but still not fast enough. Yuna was standing up and he surely wouldn't get there in time and the bell was jingling and _why was the wall crumpling in? _

He ducked to the ground and shut his eyes as Ershin called a warning and Nina screamed. When the noise stopped he dared to look up.

A-Tur, who they had fought in Chedo, who had shown them the way into the Imperial Castle, stood where Yuna had been. Blood dripped from wounds in his front half, presumably from crashing through the wall; a great deal of that wall had been converted to a new layer of carpet. More fragments were scattered on the bed, on which Elina lay. Her hands were neatly folded atop the bloodstained covers pulled up to her shoulders. She stared ahead with utter indifference. _It's to be expected - dead eyes can't look around, can they?_

"Yuna - where's Yuna?"

"I have him, m'lord."

Indeed, Yuna lay beneath A-Tur's paws, unmoving; it looked like he'd taken a few knocks from the collapsing wall as well, though some of the blood had probably come from A-Tur. Nina and Scias hurried forward and began to cast healing spells. Ryu began to lift his hands to call Ch'o Ryong to join in, before he remembered. He had questions, but it seemed crude to ask them in the middle of first aid.

Finally, it looked like the bleeding had slackened, and he spoke. "What're you doing here?"

"I was concerned for you, Young Master." A-Tur dipped his head. "I didst hear you speak of this mortal, and so I sought him out. I was unsure of how I might confront him without inciting him to flee. I thank you for your timely distraction."

"No problem," mumbled Ryu. "He's still alive?"

"He is, Young Master. You doth wish me to change this?"

"Oh - no. That's fine for now. Thanks." He went over to join Nina and Cray at the bedside.

As he approached Nina began to tremble - vibrate, almost. He ventured to place a hand on her shoulder, and she turned and pressed her face into his collarbone. Startled, he pulled back halfway but then hastily returned to his former position. She didn't seem to notice. "Ryu...oh, Ryu... she..."

He looked. The body looked surprisingly free of the rot that plagued the organs below. _Though maybe it's all on the inside. No. _"She does look like she could be-"

"Not just could be," she said, and she tilted her head up. "Ryu, she's come back."

This time he pulled back completely and glanced around the room for reactions. There were none - Scias continued plucking splinters from A-Tur and healing the points of extraction, Ershin observed the unconscious Yuna, and Cray stood on the other side of the bed, gazing down at the covers. So she couldn't have shouted. But to Ryu it made little difference.

He looked back at Nina, whose tears had created damp spots on his shirt. She nodded vigorously. "I know it sounds silly, but I swear, Ryu, she's breathing."

"Nina, she -"

"I know she did. That's why I said she came back." She leaned over the bed and held out her hand over Elina's face. "See, I felt something. You try."

He held out his hand, and in due time he felt an exhaled breath, light but there. He looked at her. "Now what?" _"Now what?" Is that the best I can come up with? You'd think with someone coming back, as Nina said, there would be more excitement than this. _

"What?"

They faced Cray, who stared across the bed at them. Nina said, "Cray...? Did you see...?"

"I don't know. Wait..." He took hold of the bottom edge of the blanket. "Sorry about this." With that he drew it upward as if he were unveiling a holy relic. After a certain point, Ryu saw the bare skin of legs, which would not have been unusual if it weren't for the fact that it only extended to a point just below the knees. Cray pulled it up about another inch, then folded the blanket over into a double layer, averting his eyes from the stains. "She didn't have these," he said. "What he did to her - she didn't have any legs anymore at all. What's this supposed to mean?"

This time Scias heard. "She's g-growing them b-back? B-but then -"

Ershin heard as well. "Deis says, few of the living can regenerate to such an extent. She says, certainly the dead cannot."

"But she's not dead," said Ryu.

"Yes. Deis says it is so."

Nina dove onto the bed and caught her in a ferocious embrace while kneeling on the half-legs. "Elina - we're here, it's all right! It's me, don't you remember me? Oh, _Elina -_"Elina stared over her shoulder.

"Id-don't think she h-hears -" Ryu turned toward Scias, who immediately stopped speaking, then stepped aside at a moan from behind him.

By the time Yuna's eyes opened, Ryu, Scias and Ershin had formed a semicircle around his head. Ryu stared down at him for a moment, uncertain of what could be said, then turned away to collect himself. Nina had begun to cast more healing spells, though they seemed to have little effect on her sister's pallor. Cray looked on with his hands moving around each other in elaborate patterns, oblivious.

Ryu turned back and said "Did you do this? Did you bring her back?"

"She says to note that if you lie you had better hope whoever was really responsible for this decides to render you aid."

"D-did y-you, then?"

Yuna let out an incoherent squeak in response. "A-Tur?" said Ryu. "A little bit lighter, please." This probably qualified as torture, but Ryu didn't much care at the moment. _You should be able to take something so much less than what you've dished out - to Elina..._

_...and to Mami. _

A-Tur nodded and eased up on the pressure on Yuna's chest, though not completely. Yuna took a breath, opened his mouth, glanced at Ershin, closed his mouth, took another breath, and opened his mouth again. "Regrettably, no."

"I g-guessed as m-much."

_Yes, to Mami. Yohm might have been the one who decided to use her in the Carronade, but if it hadn't been for you and your wanting to kill Fou-Lu - to do what? Satisfy your ego- she'd never have been caught up in all of it. Of course it's likely she'dve never met Fou-Lu at all if it hadn't happened, but wouldn't that be a small price to pay to live out the rest of her life?_

"But were I not here, she would soon have died once again."

Ryu said, "How do you figure that?"

"She is incapable of self-directed movement-"

"Yes, I would've figured that considering her legs are only about halfway done."

"Well! What I meant by self-directed," said Yuna, "is that she must be prompted to do anything, including eat and drink, and then only in minute amounts. She does not speak. Had I not come here she likely would have wasted away unnoticed." Ryu found his miffed tone grotesquely funny under the circumstances.

Scias said, "I... I know that if I w-were in that position then I w-wouldn't feel m-much like t-talking either."

"Wish Ursula was around," said Cray. "She could probably recommend a doctor or something. We'll have to ask around when we get back to the city." Ryu began preparing to talk Cray out of snapping Yuna's neck right then, and was slightly bemused when no such proposal came after. He guessed he was preoccupied with Elina's return. But what surprised him still more was that he, Ryu, had meant to give more than token protest to the idea.

He abandoned the arguments rendered unnecessary for the time being. "A-Tur? How did you get up here?"

"Young Master, if I might offer an opinion, I doubt 'twould be wise for you and your companions to attempt it with your charge."

"Okay. Thanks for telling me." He turned away from A-Tur and Yuna and got out the quilt again. "Here. Good thing we brought this." Nina nodded thanks, took it from his hands, and brought it over to the bed, unfolding it and shaking it out as she did.

When Elina was wrapped in it, Cray picked her up - he looked halfway like he was carrying a rolled carpet and halfway like he was sweeping his ladylove away to a happy ending. "I'll take care of her," he said. "Let's get out of here." Still no mention of Yuna.

"A-Tur?" said Ryu. "Pick him up and get down by whatever way you want, all right? Don't let him get away. Not again."

"As you wish. I wouldst prefer to follow you, Young Master."

"Okay. Nothing wrong with that."

A-Tur dipped his head and picked up Yuna by the collar, where he dangled like a hanged man. Cray marched through the open door with Elina in his arms; Nina followed, then Ershin and Scias. Ryu took the rear, walking alongside A-Tur. He let the bell swing freely now.

_It's strange - I used to be a god, or the closest thing to it, and this is the first miracle I've ever been privileged to see. And after the Endless left, or fell, too. _

I've really got to wonder who it was.

* * *

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Little clarification regarding the title - "Pavane for a Dead Princess" is a tune on the Breath of Fire IV soundtrack. I think it's pretty obvious, if you've read the chapter/played the game at least past Chapter Three, just who it refers to. 

So now that you've read that little tidbit (or skipped it, which is well within your rights) it would be appreciated if readers of this chapter see fit to point out what they think went wrong. Remember, it's a bit difficult for me to fix my future stuff if I don't know just why you choose not to review. Thanks again.


	8. Missing Princess

Thanks to Saikan and Airess Byrd. Now on to the next chapter, which I hope is just as qualified for your commentary.

* * *

Chapter Eight: Missing Princess

They'd managed to find a decent doctor in Astana even without Ursula to guide them. He had praised the efficacy of the healing barriers, then confirmed Yuna's diagnosis, though it looked to Nina as though he wanted to contradict it, simply on principle. Meanwhile, Yuna had been packed off to one of the holding cells in the Carronade facility. They bought some dresses and sundries for Elina, then gathered a quick dinner, after which they turned in for the night.

For once the battered tent was foregone. After all, they'd paid for a room at the inn to keep their spare things while they went to Astana Base, so they might as well make full use of their money. Also, the inn baths were desperately welcomed after their two journeys through things rotten. An order was worked out for their trips - the baths were made to accommodate multiple guests, so they tripled up. When this was decided, Ershin made her announcement.

"Deis says, 'Although I'm sure you'll miss my lovely tones, I'll not be talking myself for a while yet. Hope you can survive.'"

Ryu looked up. "Why?"

"She says, it is a secret." With that, she walked out. Nina followed for a few steps, then was obliged to call her back for help in carrying Elina down the hall.

Once there, Ershin handled the mechanics while Nina spoke cheerfully of the imitation jade tiles and patrolling soldier statuettes. She rubbed a bar of soap between her hands to make tremendous bubble confections, which were displayed without a single smile from Elina who had once without fail giggled crazily at the sight of the foamy peaks. Ershin laughed instead, a sad attempt to fill the gap of Elina's silence. When they were decent, Ershin left them for a few minutes and returned with a wheeled bed, which greatly eased the return trip.

A-Tur stood watch outside the inn room, tearing into a large trout. Nobody had connected him with the tales of destruction in Chedo, to Ryu's evident relief. "How are you?" Nina asked him. He looked up and nodded in response.

The room seemed comprised of corners. In one was a pile of the books from Astana Base, all but the ones describing what had been done to Elina - they needed those as evidence for the eventual trial, said the thaumaturgist, and nobody had much desire to look through them anyway - and the slim one that contained apparently a sketchy account of the attempts on Fou-Lu's life - more evidence, and only Ryu had dared look, skimming through with an expression of rapt horror before handing it over.

In another corner Scias and Ryu cleaned their swords and made small talk. The rest of their bedrolls were laid out in the third, and the single proper bed occupied the fourth. With Cray's help, they transported Elina onto it. While the boys gathered their bathing things Ershin went over to the pile of books and began to shuffle through the pages of the one on top of the stack.

When the door closed, Nina bent over and closed her sister's eyes. At least now it looked as if she could just be sleeping. She worked her fingers between Elina's hands and grasped them in her own. Maybe, thought Nina, if she were pulled up by her hands, pulled up till her shoulders strained, she'd wake up - it had worked when they were children. She tried this. Of course, it didn't work now.

"I thought if you could just come back," she said at last, "then everything else would take care of itself."

She got an answer, but it wasn't from Elina. "Deis says you cannot get something for nothing."

"I know. I know. It's a bit hard to believe she _is_ alive." She traced the lines on Elina's palms. "I mean, if I heard her talk, even if she didn't remember anything, I'd know for sure. But I've been wondering if this isn't some trick of Yuna's." _Remember, never again. He can never do anything like this again. _"If he found someone with yellow hair and legs half gone and dressed her up as my sister. It sounds stupid, I know, but..."

"She says it's only to be expected."

"At home… they probably don't even know she died."

"She says then they are saved some grief. They will need it all if she does not recover."

She turned. "Ershin!"

The lights in Ershin's eyes blinked. "What is the matter?"

"Nothing. Nothing. But she's got to get better, otherwise what was the point of her coming back at all?" No answer. She returned to her tracing. "I wonder who it was who brought her back. I want to thank her. It must have been terribly difficult."

"Ha ha ha ha!"

Nina stopped, her fingers poised over Elina's pulse. "What?" It was all she could do to keep it from being a snap worthy of Ursula.

"Deis says it was obviously Ryu - who, by the way, is of the male persuasion, as you no doubt are aware."

Nina looked back to her for a moment, then back to Elina. No, that couldn't be - it was too pat, too neat a solution. "Ryu? He told me he wished he _could_ have saved her. But if he had then why would he -"

She heard Ershin come up beside her. "She says, he may not have known he was doing it. She says his power was so great that when he created new bodies for the Endless he may not have kept watch on where all of it went. As Yuna attempted to transform your sister into an Endless, she might have seemed to be one without the discernment that comes with experience, and therefore the power began to reconstruct her as she was. She says we can only hope that he did not also include in his mass restoration such things as the false Endless on the Island of Fire.

"She says also that when he cast out the powers of the Endless some must have remained behind to finish the job. Hence, the healing barriers."

"But… what about you, Deis? Aren't you -"

"She says, it is difficult to reconstruct a body when there is nothing to build on."

"Oh. I'm sorry."

"She says there is nothing for you to be sorry about."

* * *

As Ryu lay on his bedroll he saw Cray and Nina slumped on either side of the bed and Ershin continuing to read by lamplight. So far, Ershin had reported, there was nothing of note. 

When they'd gotten back, when Cray had opened the door he'd seen Nina standing at it, looking first at Cray and then past him. When she'd seen Ryu she'd come out smiling and thrown herself on him, nearly knocking him over. When he struggled back up, she said "Thank you." Like a fool he had asked what she was thanking him for, and now he thought he'd rather not have known. If he really had revived Nina's sister by accident, who knew what miracles he could have worked on purpose?  
_  
I should have given it some time, thought it over before I went casting out this and sealing off that. Or was being rash what I needed to do, to do the right thing?  
_  
The more Ryu thought it over in retrospect, the less it looked like the right thing.  
_  
Sure, I wouldn't want people beating down my door, praying to me, thinking I can solve all their problems, but at least I could've tried to set more things right before I tossed out the best way I could do it. I could've - I don't know, blown apart the Carronade. Just done something.  
_  
"You're right," said the Yorae Dragon. "You could've done something."

"I'm dreaming, aren't I?"

"Well, what else could it be? Dreaming or insane. Not so very many choices there." The Yorae Dragon laughed and tossed back his head; his hair was burnished gold and as Ryu watched, it changed - flick-flick-flick - between a short ponytail like his own and long and loose like Fou-Lu's. "You don't want me," he was saying now. "First you throw away my power, and now you won't even put my mind back together." They stood in the pit where he had first met Nina. Between them was the chest from which he'd obtained clothes. Now it contained ones far finer, purple and red silks with a wide belt laid on top. Fou-Lu's clothes.

The Yorae Dragon said, "Was it the hair? Do you have something against yellow hair"

He delved into the chest and ran his fingers through the silks. "It wasn't the hair. Nina's blond too, you know."

"Oh, yes. Nina, Nina, little mourning dove." The Yorae Dragon laughed again. "I can see now. I understand. People aren't much for being inflicted with accounts of other people's romances, are they? Especially if they've yet to make real their own. It's just so - embarrassing."

"What do you mean 'if they've yet to make real'-"

"You know as much as I do." He shrugged. "I'm a figment of your subconscious, Ryu, nothing more. Just keep that in mind and you'll do fine. But I thought the little dove said her heart belonged to Cray."

He remembered being so surprised at her words that he'd forgotten to mind the fishing line, which had snapped and thrown him to the ground. "I never said she actually liked me that way."

"Yes, I know - I _would _know. One-sided love is so messy." The Yorae Dragon grimaced. "I'd hoped never to be mixed up in that sort of thing. Loving the dead is quite bad enough."

"Do you think I wanted to be"

"Of course you wouldn't. But there it is."

He was out of that pit now, and standing in another one, the one formed when he had become the Kaiser Dragon and blown apart Rasso's strongest summoning, Rasso himself, and a number of Imperial troops before Nina drew him to a halt. The dead villagers of Chek crowded around him - the dead for who he had been angry enough to become Kaiser. They all bore bleeding gashes, torn-up clothes, and blackened eyes, and they all jumped and laughed and spun and danced about like the children they seemed to be.

"I missed my friends," said the medium Rhem, who had been spared by virtue of being occupied by Deis and traveling with them at the time. She stood on the edge of the flock, clearly distinguishable in her pointed hat and goggles. "So they all came back to cheer me up. Aren't I the lucky one?"

"Time is running out," said the Abbess, standing beside Rhem. "Five or six more days and her physical body will be restored. When the healing is completed, the Yorae Dragon's power will have no more reason to stay, and the pathways will close. In your current condition you will not be able to reopen them. If you will truly save the Princess Elina, then you must do it quickly. You know what to do."

"No, I don't," he told her. "I don't."

"Young people!" she said. "They never learn."

"Why, with all else thou hath not shied away from? Why didst thou refrain from sending us home?" said P'ung Ryong, standing on the roof of his tower. He was in the form of a Wyndian, and both clothes and wings were ragged and bloodied. "Why hast thou instead knocked us down to earth and left us to ourselves? What didst thou expect us to do? Chop wood?" He jumped into the gondola beside the Oracle of Wind and flew away.

In the Gold Plains, Cray's mother Tarhn danced around the great rock favored by birds. Ch'o Ryong stood, watching her, her Woren's tail moving idly, and spoke without turning around. "As I and my compatriots hath said, we hath stood witness to the fate of the world. But none of us gave a thought to what must happen after." Tarhn swayed and spun. The birds chattered.

In an oasis in the desert, Sa Ryong drank from his cupped hands. Grit was entrenched in his clothes, in his scalp and fingernails. A blue-capped bird roasted on a spit placed over a fire burning near a wrecked sandflier. He offered Ryu another handful; Ryu declined. "If I am careful with this place," he said, "'twill last me the rest of my mortal days. I always didst wonder what 'twas like for thy mortal hermits."

"I didn't do this for you to rot in the desert for the rest of your life."

And all three were with him and they said to him, "Then, what didst thou expect us to become?"

In Chedo the people hailed him and scattered flowers in his path. As he neared the castle, General Rhun rushed out of the gates. Blood still trickled down the front of his uniform from the injuries A-Tur had dealt to him. _Such a waste._ "There you are. I apologize for any inconvenience caused you, young dragon," he said. "The First Emperor has been waiting for you."

A-Tur and Won-Qu, draped in garlands, raced each other through the castle, their joyous howls echoing toward him. He ran after them, not stopping to think that he was walking in nothing but darkness, for if he did he might fall. Down stair after stair until he arrived in the darkened gardens of the inner castle; there was no sign of Won-Qu or A-Tur.

"I couldna stand t'see ye look so sad!" Mami cried from inside the throne room. "That be better, then?" And inside the throne room Fou-Lu laughed and laughed. Ryu hung back for a moment, then rushed through.

As he entered and ran up the carpet, the voices and the laughter stopped. Lying just below one of the blue-green lamps lined up on either side of the great stairs was the Thirteenth Emperor's headless body - he was another person Ryu had never seen. As for the living there was only Fou-Lu, clad in full Imperial garb and seated on the throne, holding Mami's bell.

Fou-Lu threw the bell at him and it nearly struck him in the head. "These art but fleeting sentiments!" Fou-Lu declared, and the beads strung onto his headdress swayed as he shook his head. "They mean nothing! Come, come hither, thou who art me."

"Are you sure you know what you're doing?" said Ryu as he backed away. "Do you know what this means for you? Do you?"

"Yes" said Fou-Lu. He stood up and advanced down the stairs. "Yes, I doth know that very well. Why else would I proceed? Come to me!"

Ryu woke then and sat up before he opened his eyes. His forehead collided with something. He discovered, when he finally did open his eyes, that it was the end of A-Tur's muzzle. "Sorry."

"'Tis nothing, Young Master." Once he'd backed far enough away to avoid another collision, A-Tur dipped his head low. "You find your dreams troubling?"

He rubbed his forehead. "You could say that, yeah. Fou-Lu… he's dying."

"I know."

"What do you mean-"

"I didst hear your discourse outside the village. But you need not worry, Young Master."

"He's dying. He's getting _drawn into me_." Ryu flung out his arms and nearly struck A-Tur again; he hastily withdrew them. "What's there not to worry about?"

"Ere his rest, as long as we hath existed, we wert aware that this might come to pass." It couldn't be right, thought Ryu. It couldn't be right that anyone could talk about something like this and be so serene at the same time. "He is reunited with his other half, as was his wish. Even if he that I knew ceases to exist, he will live on in you."

He shook his head. "You're just saying that to make me feel better, aren't you? What part of him? His memories? His way of talking? His dress sense? Not what holds it together, that's the most important part."

A-Tur had no answer for that. "Wilt thou mind if I rest awhile?"

"Of course not. Everyone has to, once in a while."

"I didst not, till recently."

"That's just it, isn't it? It's probably catching up with you. Good night, A-Tur."

"Good night, Young Master."

Now he found it obscene, just like the serenity. _Why do you act like it's not any different? It's just that now there's a young master instead of an old one? _"No. Stop that. Please. I'm nobody's master."

"Not even of yourself, then?"

"Not even of myself."

* * *

"The filter's on, right?" She cringed at the voice - it was so high and _cute_. If the others heard it like this they'd never let her live it down. 

"The filter is activated, Deis. You seem to have retained locomotive and vocalization skills."

"Well, I did have that kid to practice on."

"Indeed. Maturity of your current habitation is not projected for approximately six more days at current rate of growth."

"Great."

"I join you in your joy."

"I was being sarcastic."

"So you were."

"You're annoying as ever. I think I'm going to miss you."

"As will I."

* * *

AUTHOR'S NOTES: There. That wasn't so bad, was it? If you've made it this far, do go a bit further, click "submit review," and give me a piece of your mind. 

To Saikan:You're right -I'll try to work on that.


	9. Dragon's Eye

Thanks, as always, for your comments.

* * *

Chapter Nine: Dragon's Eye

The next morning Nina found a merchant preparing to make a run to Shikk and willing to spare an assistant to drive back their sandflier, and the Imperial contingent came through the Causeway. They lacked the ubiquitous army uniform, as well as weaponry besides the odd dagger and one firearm, and before anyone realized what they were it had been explained.

"Excuse me, excuse me, good people of Kyoin!" called out the apparent leader, waving his hands about. One of his compatriots jabbed him in the side, and he hastily put the gun down. "We come from Chedo on the order of General Ursula." _So she's a general now._ "We've come to hire Purifiers. Would any of you know where we might find some?" He said this while glancing about the "street," well aware that Imperials requesting Purifiers was hardly routine.

"Deis says you might try Chamba. After they have finished eradicating the hex there, that is. It may take some time, however, and they may not be so enthusiastic about your proposition."

He nodded in Ershin's general direction. "Thank you, ah…" His prior aplomb dissolved. "Is it ma'am?"

"She says ma'am is fine."

"Alrighty, then. Thank you, ma'am." With that he picked up his gun and they marched up to the Imperial Kyoin outpost, with a few curious glances at Won-Qu and A-Tur, who stared back.

_It's been two days._ Ryu stood near the end of the dock, fingering the bell and watching as the merchant's sandflier dwindled into the distance. _Two days already. The dream said six. How accurate was it? And why haven't I done something by now? _

He knew the answer to the last question, at least. The previous nights they had been camped out in Mukto after fetching Won-Qu from Fou-Lu's tomb - Won-Qu had been told of Fou-Lu's impending demise and took it as terribly calmly as A-Tur - and at the Kyoin inn. Cray had never been away from Elina for more than five minutes, and when he hadn't been there Nina had been. They would want to know what Ryu intended, and his heart threatened to jump up his throat and out his mouth when he imagined explaining - inviting either incredulity or false hope - then trying and getting nothing. He feared getting no result regardless, but many fears became worse when you set them in front of other people.

She sat on the dock, between Nina and Cray. Her long dress did a fine job of disguising her half-grown legs, though her inability to walk was rather given away when Cray had to carry her. The dress was a cascade of floral print over the edge of the dock; he almost deluded himself into seeing a pair of shoes just visible under the wide ruffle. More ruffles at the cuffs concealed her folded hands. She stared with the eyes of an oversize doll. Beyond her Nina sat kicking her feet in midair and staring off as well, as if she were trying to see what her sister saw in the distance.

A few dockworkers hovered as close to Won-Qu and A-Tur as they dared; Ryu had caught them throwing glances - not quite as discreet as they seemed to think - in the direction of the sitting trio. Clearly, they dreaded the thought of yet more misfortune befalling the elder Princess of Wyndia.

They'd not made a secret of what had happened to her in the Empire, and as there wasn't much else to do in Kyoin they still readily explained to any who asked, though they took pains to explain that the man responsible was now imprisoned and it was highly unlikely that it would ever happen again. Also, they skipped everything concerning her death and resurrection. "They wouldn't understand," Nina had said in private. "They'd concentrate on only that, how it happened and who did it. She's coming home, that's what matters."

_Sure, that matters. But doesn't coming back from the dead matter too?_ he hadn't said.

Now he said, "Should I get some more water?"

Cray said, "No, no, I'll do it." Ryu was surprised for a moment, then realized that constantly hovering around a mute shell who was supposed to be someone you knew and cared for had to become tiring after a while. "You - won't let anything happen to her, all right?"

Ryu said, "I won't," and sat down at Elina's side as Cray left.

He knew, roughly, where everyone would be. Won-Qu and A-Tur would still be standing guard. Scias wasn't much for the desert heat - he would be at the inn, pressing a conjured ice crystal to his head. Cray - getting water, maybe bumming some more ice off Scias. Ershin - with Scias, maybe.

_Lay your hands on Ershin, close your eyes. _

Ryu edged his hand toward the pool of gathered ivory in Elina's lap and delved into it, managing to find two of her limp fingers. From there he found the rest of her hand, which he held. Nobody noticed, and even if they did embarrassment would be nothing compared to what might happen if he stayed paralyzed by the fear of it. He had to finish what he most likely had started.

Ryu knew he couldn't have expected to be drawn into a mindscape the moment he shut his eyes, especially in his current condition and with no assistance from the Abbess, but he felt vague disappointment when it didn't happen, regardless.

_Do you hear me we've met I'm a friend of your sisters and uh could you come back now because everyone's getting worried. Please?_

How must he look, sitting here with his eyes squeezed closed and clutching Elina's hand as if he, not Cray, was the one who loved her.

He called to the power that had once been his. _Don't you remember me I'm the Yorae Dragon at least I used to be and I know I got rid of you but could you please come to me for a bit longer, there's someone I've got to save. _

Someone speaking, with an inquisitive lift at the end of the sentence. Was it Nina, had she noticed what he was doing? He shut it out, leaving only the dark behind his eyelids and his pleas - were they going somewhere or did they only ricochet around his mind?

_Let me help you I can't very well leave you like this. _

More voices - Nina explaining to Cray, best as she could, what was going on? He didn't know. He couldn't afford to pay attention to that.

_Oh please come back if I'd known it would mean leaving her like this if I knew it meant killing Fou-Lu I never would've done it I swear I -_

He fell and Nina screamed. The sound seemed to propel him forward, and he was unsurprised when no sand met his face. Ryu tumbled, lost his grip, suddenly incredibly cold, at no point contacting anything else until his feet met a surface and stayed there. Only then did he open his eyes, and then continuous light from right, left, downward, upward and forward blinded him so much that he might as well have kept them shut.

He turned around, keeping track of each directional shift. Directly behind him, as far as he could figure, was what resembled a giant mirror, seemingly floating in the light that came from behind it, framed in dark metal with glowing blue symbols. When he looked into it he saw Nina standing on the dock and leaning forward, speaking rapidly and inaudibly. Ryu himself was sprawled below, motionless, the bell still on its cord and glinting against the sand - instinctively, he reached for it, and found it there. Beside him, her hand still twined with his, was Elina, the skirt of her dress scattered outward. Cray had jumped down from the dock; now he removed his fingers from Elina's wrist, where presumably he'd been checking her pulse, and gently pulled the skirt back down over her knees.

What was this, Ryu wondered, and he knew. It was a metaphor, of sorts, for the gate back to the living world. If he passed through it, it would wake him up again. But he shouldn't do it quite yet.

Ryu turned forward again, stopped and listened. If he kept absolutely quiet he could hear a sound far away. He set off towards it at a run. The bell jingled.

* * *

Ryu guessed he had been running for roughly an hour. Now he was close enough to know it was a woman's voice, high and frantic, its actual words still indecipherable. He had yet to tire - in the mind there was only mental fatigue. The fatigue, maybe, was what caused the double echoes; he wouldn't pay any mind to the sound of his feet hitting the unseen ground but for the fact that he seemed to hear it twice each time. Maybe that was a quirk of traveling in mindscapes, though he hadn't remembered this with Deis. 

He thought he could see a brief shadow beyond the light. He thought he could make something out of the voice. What was she saying?

"Get away, go away!"

That was hardly encouraging.

"There's nothing for you here, go away!"

He wasn't going this far, and he wasn't worrying everyone as much as he doubtless had, collapsing off the dock like that, just to run right back without doing anything. He ran on.

The light ended with no warning. His momentum propelled him a ways past before he hit someone from behind. She cried out and fell.

"Sorry. Er." _Should I call her princess? I haven't called Nina that for a while, and it seems odd to call one princess and not the other. But I barely know Elina. And if I do, should I call her just princess or… oh, forget it._ "Ma'am?" Unless you were talking to a man or a child, you rarely went wrong with ma'am.

She stood up and drew herself to a little bit taller than Ryu. Now they were both suspended in blackness instead of light - he couldn't call it darkness, he could see her quite well. As it was in the last place, there was nothing else but black, but he had a feeling that this space was a good bit smaller. "You can't leave well enough alone can you!"

He'd certainly heard her voice before. It was the tone that startled him. The Elina he had met had been so very calm. Calm as Won-Qu and A-Tur were now, in fact. "Ah - what do you mean?"

"You can go back and tell him that if he wants an Endless he can try it on _himself _next ti - oh!" Her eyes widened. "I'm sorry - you're Nina's friend, aren't you? Ryu, the Endless?"

"That would be me. But I'm not exactly an Endless now. I came here to -"

"I know." She clasped her hands. "I'm sorry - thank you for coming so far, but it's been a waste of your time. Goodbye."

He swallowed. Had he come this far to discover that she was locked out - or in, as the case might be? "Why is it a waste of my time?"

"I asked Cray to do it for a reason," she whispered, bowing her head. "It might sound vain, but I'm not coming back to - to_ that_. There's no way that I would even fit in the castle."

"Er. Your legs should be done in maybe three, four days at the most. And they're normal size far as I can tell."

She looked up and lifted a hand to her mouth. He was reminded of Nina. "How do you mean?"

He understood. "All those giant organs and whatnot? They're not yours anymore. They're rotting back in Astana. You're back as you were - at least you will be, like I said, when your legs get back."

"You must be joking, or mistaken."

"No joke."

"Just as it was before?"

"Unless you're going to grow flippers instead of feet, it looks like it."

"But how did…?"

He shrugged. "I'd like to know myself."

"So then… you're saying I could come back?"

"Yeah. That's what I'm saying."

Her head went down again. "I don't know. Is it right? So many dying every day and me of all people - I don't know."

Ryu was fairly sure he shouldn't be feeling so exasperated on a rescue mission. "It's not as if you'll keep_ on_ not dying. Just put it up to really good luck, all right? And Cray and Nina and everyone're going to keep on waiting for you to come back no matter what, now that they've seen you're alive on the outside at least, so why do this halfway?"

"And… he…the one who…"

"Yuna's in prison, and if I know Ursula she'll do everything she can to make him stay that way. And she's a general now, I bet she can do a lot. Now. Can you come with me?"

She simply nodded. They stared at each other for a while longer before Ryu, feeling foolish, turned around, and they walked back into the light. The mirror was before them - it seemed to have followed him. In the image now he lay on a bed in the Kyoin inn, his sword leaned against one of the bedposts, still holding Elina's hand; she was on another bed, which had been pushed close to its twin, maybe so their arms wouldn't be stretched excessively. The group had gathered around them.

"It's not what it looks like. I mean… ah… I couldn't think of any other bit I could… er…youknow… touch…?"

"I know," she said. "One more thing. Who-"

"Yes?"

"Never mind, it can wait." She stepped up beside him. "Cray," she said. "Nina." Then she sprang forward with her arms flung out and faded through as if it were an upright pool. As the distortions faded, the Elina of the image jerked and let go of his hand. Nina's mouth opened in an unheard shriek and she ran forward, Cray just behind.

After he was satisfied that she'd made it, Ryu pressed his hand to the surface, which gave easily, rippling as it did, with a slight shock of cold. He prepared to jump through himself. _I've done it. I've brought her back. At least that bit's all right now -  
_  
Someone grabbed the back of his shirt and twirled him around, throwing him to the ground, inasmuch as there was one. As he fell everything _changed_ - he couldn't point out subtle gradations of the light or any such thing, but everything felt different, more familiar. It was a soft landing, at least. When he looked up Fou-Lu stood above him.

"What are you doing hanging around in her mind?" he said, his indignation temporarily superseding any other emotion. "And what was_ that_ for?"

"I hath been behind thee. I apologize. But now that we art only with ourselves, I must know why!"

_He was what Elina saw…? _Ryu's spine clenched; for a terrible moment so did his throat. "Should I have just let her rot while she was still alive, then?"

"For mine other half, thou dost understand painfully little. I didst not speak of her, but of us." Fou-Lu leaned forward and grabbed Ryu's wrists, then his arms, pulling firmly but gently all the while until their faces were inches apart. "End this farce."

Ryu struggled to regain his footing; it was only Fou-Lu that was keeping him from falling back down. "What farce?"

"We are the Yorae Dragon. We are one. Why dost thou hold back from joining the two of us once more?"

Ryu craned his neck to see the mirror to their left, began to figure out when the best time would be to run, then wondered why he was doing it. He'd been trying to get in contact with Fou-Lu for some time, and here he was now and all Ryu could think of was getting away from him. "Because I don't want to kill you."

"Thou dost not wish to kill me?" Fou-Lu laughed. It hurt Ryu's ears. _Lying at the center of a hex and seeing the bell fall and laughing and laughing…_

"Wouldst thou condemn me to a full span of meaningless life, simply to assuage thy conscience? I hath given you the last thing I hath to give, and thou hast rejected it out of hand. I am nothing."

"You're something," said Ryu, "else I'm talking to myself."

He laughed again. "Thou _art_ talking to thyself, or should be, by all rights. End this, Ryu, make us truly one so that I might take my leave of this world."

"Not if I can help it."

"Thou canst not help it. I didst hear her speak - thou art only delaying the inevitable."

"I only need to delay it until I can get you out. And I will."

And again. "'Tis unlikely such is within thy means." Ryu winced. That much was true. "Even if thou hast, I will not go. There is nothing more in this world that I might be a part of."

"There's got to be something. There's us, after all."

"Thy friends are thy friends. They hath nothing to do with me. As for her -" Fou-Lu glanced at the bell still hanging around Ryu's neck and shuddered. "She is dead. There is nothing."

Ryu decided not to argue with this. "But Won-Qu and A-Tur…"

"… are now thine to command. They hath known this might come to pass, as long as they hath known me. Hath they not told you this?"

"Yes, they said that, but that's not the point-"

"Enow." He let go, and Ryu reeled backward. When he stabilized himself Fou-Lu's sword materialized in his hand with a flash; he nearly dropped it. Fou-Lu smiled and tipped back his head, exposing his throat. "Come, come hither, thou who art me." The image seemed to shiver for a moment, then held fast.

_If I kill him now will he really die? Yes. We're both… representations, running around in a symbol, laid on and joined up to whatever's underneath so we can figure out more easily what we're doing, what to do. If I kill him then in "real life" all of what's him is going to merge with me all at once, and that'll be it. At least it'll be quick…_

_No. _

Ryu flung out his arm and let go of the sword. As it vanished before it hit the invisible ground, he dove through the surface of the image. The chill came, and he shut his eyes, prepared for another fall, or maybe this time it would be a rising. Instead he stopped, suspended. Arms were wrapped around him, just above his waist - Fou-Lu had gotten hold of him before he was completely through. He flailed, trying to find something to hang on to, some kind of leverage.

Voices from both sides bounced around and struck his ears.

"Elina, I'm sorry-"

"Oh, _Elina_-"

"Ryu, hold. Hold!"

"Let go!" he shouted back, but his words seemed to die as they emerged.

"Why canst we not attempt waking the Young Master?"_ I thought I told you not to call me that. _"Surely his business hath been completed with her revival."

"She says, not necessarily. She says, forcing him awake will be detrimental to his mind."

"Can't we talk to him?"

"She says she fails to see how that would be a problem."

"All right, thank you. Ryu?"

"Ryu, can y-you hear m-me?"

"Come on, come on!"

"Wake up," said Elina. "Please. If it's going to be your life for mine then really I-"

He was being drawn back, in spite of his struggles. Fou-Lu would keep him here, then, until either his physical body wasted away and they both died, or until he finally killed Fou-Lu, as was his wish. _This can't be how it ends. _

He slid back through into a heap. Fou-Lu released his legs and helped him up. He could see everyone clustered around his bed, Elina seated with her face in her hands and Cray with an arm awkwardly draped around her shoulders, Nina leaning over him - was she crying- before Fou-Lu stepped in front of him and blocked out the image.

"Why is it," said Fou-Lu, "that we must always disagree on such vital matters?"

He shrugged. "It's too bad."

"Indeed. Let us put an end to such disagreements now. Thou hast only to concede this last one to me."

Fou-Lu smiled. The sword reappeared in Ryu's hand. All over again.  
_  
This can't be how it ends I won't let it be. I want to live I want both of us to live. I don't know what to do. _

But I have a guess.

He hefted the sword best as he could with his arms shaking. Fou-Lu didn't seem to think anything was amiss - he knew Ryu didn't want him to die, so of course Ryu would be afraid to finally do it.

The sword sliced the air, and the flat side struck Fou-Lu on the side of the head. Fou-Lu echoed its arc and fell to the side, temporarily stunned. Ryu dropped the sword and threw his arms around his other half, pulling him half-upright, then jumped forward with him in tow. Just before they met the surface of the image, just before Ryu shut his eyes again, Fou-Lu's smile began to fade.

Leaving was many times worse than entering. Ryu tightened his grip on Fou-Lu, who thrashed like a fish and shouted something that was no competition for the mental typhoons that screamed around them, jumbled with more voices. "Hang on," he called; his words fared no better. "Almost there," he called, reasoning that he didn't know if it wasn't true.

"He's moving!"

* * *

"He's moving!" said Nina. "Do you think he heard us?" 

"She says that is unlikely."

It was strange how short a time they'd had to celebrate Elina's true return before they turned to fretting about Ryu; it seemed to Nina that he had rescued her sister by giving her his own consciousness. As they looked on, his back arched and his mouth opened, moving silently for a while before it closed and he lay still once again.

A knock on the door. "Excuse me?" It was the innkeeper again. "Would you like something to eat _now_?"

As they looked at each other to figure out who would be the one to decline for the ninth time in as many hours, Scias cut in. "Yes,

please." The food was brought in and the innkeeper left, after a wide-eyed glance at Elina, who smiled and nodded back. "W-what?"

Cray put his free hand to his face. "This isn't a time for food, Scias." His stomach audibly disagreed.

"It… it's n-not j-just f-for us. W-when he w-wakes up he'll b-be hungry, w-won't he? H-he's skipped just as m-much as us."

"Thou hast a fine argument," said Won-Qu.

Cray hurriedly turned to Elina as the implication struck him. "Are you - do you need to…"

"Oh no, it can wait. I -"

A-Tur yowled. Nina looked and saw Ryu begin to float up from the bed, surrounded again by an aura akin to what had surrounded him during his transformations, which expanded as he rose until he threatened to hit the ceiling - that hadn't happened when he'd started . She opened her mouth, then closed it - with all the shrieking she had done over Elina's not-nearly-as-dramatic return, any sound now would seem pathetically anticlimactic.

The others seemed to feel the same way, and they looked on in silence as Ryu drifted back downward to his original position and the aura continued to hang in midair, glowing all the brighter. As he met the sheets his eyes opened and he sat up. "Thanks, Scias," he said. "Are there any eggs?"

"Y-yes, they're -" Scias got out before the aura exploded.

Technically Nina knew it was impossible to be knocked backward by an explosion composed only of light, but she fell over regardless as a multitude of spots blotted out her vision for a few seconds.

"… h-hard b-boiled," Scias finished.

She stood up and rubbed her eyes while Elina said, "Oh, don't worry, Cray, I'm fine."

Cray said, "Are you sure?"

"Yes, absolutely sure."

Nina fetched the platter with eggs cut in slices and brought it over. "Are you all right?"

He reached for a slice. "Fine, just… tired." Another yawn threatened to crack his jaw. Then his eyes widened slightly as he focused on something behind her. "Er. Could you turn around and tell me if you see what I see?"

She nodded and turned around, then stifled a gasp. "You see Fou-Lu, right?"

That was what she saw, anyway, maybe a little fuzzy around the edges but it was him, leaning against the wall with his arms folded. There was a chorus of shocked murmurs as the others saw him as well, and then Won-Qu and A-Tur dashed past, curbing their enthusiasm after one of Won-Qu's paws inadvertently passed through him. He looked up and nodded at them in acknowledgement.

"I saw him before," said Elina. "He was standing behind you, but I thought… I guess I thought you knew…"

"I know. That's right. 's good." Fou-Lu - would you call him a ghost? He wasn't quite dead, was he- turned from Won-Qu and A-Tur and glared. Evidently he did not think this was good, for whatever reason. "At least he's out, even if there's nowhere to put him… just yet… Mmm." Nina turned around. He swallowed his slice of egg, smiled at her, and promptly dropped back to the bed, his eyes closed once again. She found his pulse after a few seconds of frantic scrabbling.

"Deis says it was probably the strain. She says he will likely be recovered tomorrow."

She clutched at his wrist, desperate for the confirming beat of the flowing blood. "He'll likely be recovered?"

"She says that she will not be blamed if it happens that he is not."

"Th… that's v-very encouraging," Scias half- muttered.

She looked at the phantom, who stared back before he leapt forward and through her. This time she did cry out, and when she turned she saw him staring down at his legs, which had sunk through the mattress. As he looked down they rose up so that Fou-Lu stood on the bed, and then he knelt and grasped at Ryu's hands, which passed through his own as Won-Qu's paw had. He tried again several times, then looked up, noticed his audience and vanished - she had expected fading or dissipation, but he was simply not there anymore.

And Ryu's sword, leaned up against the bedpost, glowed. They all stared at it as the glow reached a crescendo and then faded to a faint shimmer, almost invisible. Then Ershin said, "She says it will not be as simple an arrangement as with us, but it might work for a time."

Cray said, "You mean now he's… I don't know, possessed the sword?"

"She says it is so. She says it can be very confusing for a spirit with no anchor."

Scias said, "I… I j-just hope it d-doesn't start t-talking after he leaves it. N-no offense."

"She says, unlikely. I was animated by her Endless aura. And now, as you all know, there are no more Endless."

Nina whispered, "I know."

_And is it a good thing or a bad thing? _


	10. Sword and Armor

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thanks again. On to the fic.

* * *

Chapter Ten: Sword and Armor

Cray emerged from belowdecks. "It all looks ready to go. How about us? Are we ready?" Near-synchronized affirmations came from those assembled on the dock, with Ryu's having a significant lag. As Deis predicted, he had gotten up that morning with nothing worse than muzzy eyes and hunger.

The upper deck of their sandflier was crowded nearly to the point of significant discomfort. It was a good thing that they traveled light - otherwise, thought Nina, if there was a sandstorm or the like a few arms and legs would probably end up sticking out of the hatch. She hauled a chair from below for Elina to sit on, and then went to her usual spot at the prow. Ryu joined her at his soon afterward. Won-Qu and A-Tur took positions just behind them, on either side of the hatch. Beyond them Ershin and Scias took one side while Elina had the other to herself; she carried on a half-shouted conversation with Cray as the latter climbed into the back of the sandflier, where the steering mechanism was located, and started them out of Kyoin and across the desert to where, eventually, Shyde awaited.

It seemed that extended travel was always perilous, tedious or both. After a half hour Nina grew tired of counting the passing sand dunes and looked for something else to do. She thought of talking to Elina, but at the moment she was still speaking with Cray, and it would be rude to interrupt. Scias had gone belowdecks. Ershin had brought the books up on deck and was completely engrossed. "Anything interesting?" she asked.

"She says that if by interesting you include disgusting in a fascinating way, then yes."

When she turned in Ryu's direction he was contemplating the sword, apparently oblivious to all else. "Are you okay?"

He looked up. "I'm okay." His words were as glass.

She remembered the phantom Fou-Lu vanishing and the sword glowing. "Is it very strange?"

Again he understood exactly - there wasn't even a blink before he said, "It would feel odd using it like a regular sword. I keep on thinking he'll start, I don't know, shouting at me in the middle of a fight. Or even just shouting, at whatever time. Least then I couldn't complain about being bored."

"I guess I couldn't complain, either."

"I just hope the Abbess can do something about it. It can't be a good life hanging around in a sword."

"Yes, that's right. Ah, Ryu?"

"What is it?"

"How did you do it? I mean, without any powers?"

"Some of it that used to be mine was still in there," he said. "It hadn't done with healing her yet. I hitched a ride on it, I guess."

She noted with pleasure that he'd stopped denying his role in her sister's restoration. "Oh. Wasn't that very difficult?"

"Not really."

"I was - we were all worried for you. I mean, supposing you got something wrong and were trapped in there instead of my sister?"

"I know. I'm sorry."

She forced in a good dose of the cheerfulness she'd once had in such abundance. "But you're back now."

"So I am."

Nina counted two more sand dunes before she could think of something else to say, but by then she'd seen the running man. "Look - I wonder what he's doing out here."

Ryu looked. "I don't think it's for his health. More like he's…"

"As though he wert fleeing, Young Master?"

Ryu took no notice of the honorific. "You're right. Cray!" He waved, and then gestured when he had Cray's attention. "Could we pull over the sandflier for him? If he's a bandit we can take him down all right."

The sandflier began dragging to a halt. Ryu and Ershin tossed out a rope ladder and the running man leapt for it as it unfurled, scrambled upward, then tripped on the top rung and landed on his face on the deck of the sandflier. "They art closing in," he cried, gasping, as Scias climbed up and Ershin helped him to his feet. "We must make haste. Thou wilt not halt this craft if thy value on thy life be high!"

Cray turned it slightly and maintained the same steady speed. "Why?"

In response, the man jabbed a finger in the direction from which he came. In the distance was a speck which soon revealed itself to be another sandflier. "They art in pursuit, though I hath done no wrong." He looked around the deck for signs of belief, saw Ryu, and ran forward. Won-Qu and A-Tur started to block him, but a wave and a shout from Ryu and they quickly withdrew. "Thou art the Yorae Dragon. Art thou not?"

"Yes," said Ryu slowly. "It's you, isn't it, Sa Ryong?" Nina waited a moment and utterly failed to be shocked by this; that in itself was a slight shock. He offered his water canteen. "Just like in the dream."

Sa Ryong accepted it and nodded vigorously as the sandflier gathered speed. "Thou hast created my current body, so thou shouldst remember its likeness, even if 'tis only in thy dreams."

The other sandflier pulled still closer. It was a good bit larger than theirs, and Nina made out nine or ten soldiers standing around on the deck, with another steering. Near the prow was a vaguely familiar face. "That's the Ludian prince," she said. "And that's Alliance military uniform." On the other sandflier she saw them begin to point - apparently they were making identifications of their own. The prince, especially, did an exceptional goldfish impression. _You wrote off my sister. Surprised, aren't you?_ There was a strange pleasure in her anger.

"Oh… j-joy," said Scias. "N… now they'll t-try g-getting us along w-with him."

"Too bad for them," said Cray, and the sandflier shot away. The other sandflier slowed down for a moment, then took off after.

The first explosion was a ways to the side and flung sand in all directions. When Nina got the sand out of her eyes and looked back she saw one of the soldiers on the nearing flier preparing to toss another.

"Deis says it would be advisable for those who cannot fight from a distance to go belowdecks. Up here you are merely another target." Ryu nodded with evident reluctance, kicked open the hatch, and helped Elina down, followed by Sa Ryong, who still held Ryu's canteen. Won-Qu and A-Tur jumped in after, with a quick glance to be sure they would crush no one by their landing. Then Ershin threw in the books. As the hatch shut the next few landed behind them. One would have hit their flier, but Scias froze a ball of ice around it. The explosion simulated a few seconds' light rain and threw Nina to the deck. She got up and murmured an incantation, and the approaching sandflier was spun around for a few seconds in an artificial typhoon. It came down in the opposite direction, necessitating a hurried turnaround on their part.

Sometime during the next two hours the other sandflier must have run out of explosives, as they turned to straight pursuit. And they were gaining, in spite of Nina's minor typhoons - when she'd run out of energy for them, she'd taken weak potshots with her staff - and Cray's evasive maneuvers. As it began to pull up side-to-side Ryu came back on deck, followed by Won-Qu and A-Tur.

"Your turn to go down now," he told her. "It'll probably be a melee." He was right, as Ershin had been when telling him to take cover before, and there was no time for token protest.

As she began to climb down the ladder to belowdecks, the other sandflier turned and made for theirs at top speed. In the nick of time their sandflier turned sharply, nearly spun; Nina almost cracked her head on the side of the hatch. She saw Ershin go over the railing and off the flier in a long arc, and as she screamed and began scrabbling her way back onto the deck, and as Cray cursed and as Ryu shouted, Ershin landed hard. The top of the armor popped open, expelling something that shot a ways further, trailing a dark blue streamer, before it, too, landed and lay still. A second later the other sandflier saw this and turned again, making for the easier prey. Cray was turning theirs as well, but it was all happening so slowly and there was no way -

Before she could raise any mental objections, before more seconds were lost, Nina jumped off the railing, beating her wings so that they nearly vibrated with the motion. As she descended she grabbed the thing in the sand and held it close as her glide turned into a tumble and the sandflier rushed past them, nearly mowing them down. She lay where she fell for a few seconds more before she got up and saw what she was holding.

Eyes obscured by masses of dark blue hair stared up at her. For a moment she thought it might be a Pabpab - its hair was longer than it was tall, and it made coils on the sand. The next moment she was thankful for the amount of hair, as it appeared to be a girl of about eleven or twelve, in the same state as Ryu had been on their first meeting.

"Damn it," said the girl.  
_  
What was a child doing inside Ershin?_

"Three days. Three more days! That was all I wanted!"

_Oh._ "Deis? Is that you?"

"No," she snapped back, "It's P'ung Ryong. Of course it's me." Her voice was nothing like that of the Deis they'd met when wandering in her dream, or the voice when she spoke through her armor, or even what had issued from the medium Rhem. But when you were a child, wasn't that kind of voice what came naturally? _Was this why she didn't want to talk? _

Deis pushed away from her and stood up to watch the approach of Won-Qu and A-Tur, the latter with the armor grasped in his jaws. As they looked on Won-Qu growled at the sandflier, which had swung around for another go, and it hastily reversed direction. "Thank you," said Nina as he bent down for her to climb on.

Deis marched over to A-Tur. "Give me that!" He duly lowered the armor to the ground, and she jumped in and slammed down the top. A-Tur picked it up again, with Deis grumbling from inside with her child's voice. Their sandflier had pulled around, and with a few bounds they were back on the deck. After Nina got off and Ershin was set down Won-Qu and A-Tur made for the other sandflier.

Fou-Lu's powers might be gone with those of the other dragons, but some had been left behind in the strength of their jaws and claws. Within a half hour the battle was won with nothing more than superficial injuries, which Nina and Scias quickly banished with light healing spells and a few appropriate herbs.

Once they were well away from the downed sandflier and back on the way to Shyde she went belowdecks, got out some of her spare clothing and showed it to Ershin, who balked. "Deis says she will not emerge again for some time."

"Just in case something like that happens again," said Nina. The top of the armor promptly flipped open and she dropped in the bundle without looking inside.

"She says thank you."

"Why are you still not talking?" asked Ryu, his eyes still slightly wider than normal. "I mean, we know now what it is."

"She says that your knowledge is not a reason for her to flaunt it."

"I wouldn't call it flaunting," said Nina. "Flaunting would be more… deliberate, wouldn't it?"

"She says, nevertheless."

Ryu sighed and turned to Sa Ryong, who was leaned against the railing and tilting the canteen to his mouth; there couldn't be more than a few drops left in there. So strange to think that a being who had once brought down their sandflier (hers and Cray's, they hadn't yet met the others back then) was reduced to a lanky man with grit in his hair and under his nails and inextricable with the rough weave of his clothes. "Now, could you explain more about why they were chasing you?"

"They didst come upon me and request my identity, as they knew of no mortals who resided near. Apparently I hath not been a 'good neighbor.'"

Ryu put his hand to his forehead. "You told them who you were?"

Sa Ryong flushed. "I hath… not so much knowledge of subterfuge. Some days after, they returned and didst attempt to persuade me to return with them, as they didst believe I could be of help in their war."

Nina said, "Didn't they know you lost your powers? You did, right?"

"Verily, I hath. But they wert loath to believe it, and waxed wroth upon my refusal. Whereupon," he concluded, "I took my leave. Hast thou more water to spare?"

Scias nodded and passed over his own half-full canteen. "As… m-much as you w-want. You j-just c-cast ice s-spells and l-let it m-melt."

"I must thank thee."

"It's n-nothing."

Sa Ryong turned back to Ryu. "Might I accompany thee to thy destination, if 'tis not an inordinate burden? I believe 'twould be an unwise course to remain in the desert."

"'s fine with me. Anyone have a problem?" No one had.

"So," she said to him that afternoon as they sat alone on the deck, drinking more tepid water, "that's another lucky accident to your credit, Ryu. With Deis, I mean."

He stared at her. "Why are you so sure it was me this time?"

She blinked. "Well, who else do you think it could it have been?"

"Just not me. Isn't one 'lucky accident' like that enough for one lifetime?"

"Of course it's enough, if it's such a big one."

"If I could just have it for a while longer," he said, "Just a little while longer. I know I couldn't set everything right in the world even if I had forever to do it in, but couldn't I have tried to make it better? At least I could've fixed some of what got broken."

"You mean like what happened to Chedo?"

He balanced his sword on his lap. "I was thinking more of what happened to people. Like General Rhun, and Mami from Sonne. If all of this hadn't happened they'd probably still be doing all right."

"You think they shouldn't have died?"

"Of course I don't think they should've, not so soon. If I just hadn't been so hasty then I might've been able to take it all back. They could've - no, they _would've_ died again someday, sure, but at least I would've kept it from them for a little while longer." He laughed, short and sharp, and she thought of Fou-Lu. "Oh, I thought I was being so _noble_, tossing out all that power. The truth is I was scared. Scared that I might slip and end up blowing apart the whole world instead someone like that Rasso, next time. But what made it so much worse than power like you've got? Your typhoons and your vitalizations?"

She guessed, "Because there was so much more of it than anyone else had?"

"Nina, this isn't a test. If you don't know I don't either. And I don't." He didn't get up and start pacing, or smack a fist into his other hand like Cray, or even fold his arms. Nina would have felt better if he had done that, or just about anything besides sit there and just talk, with only his voice shifting.

"The world doesn't need it, sure, but it could've made things easier, couldn't it? And what did they do, the others, what did they do that made me think I needed to drag them in with me? It wasn't as if they ran about blowing up cities and demanding sacrifices. And after all that I didn't even send them home. No, I just gave them new bodies and stuck them back down here and sent them off - to do what? Get a job chopping wood? And not even a little bit of it left, a little bit to defend themselves. You heard what happened to Sa Ryong!" He slumped. "I must have had some kind of reason for doing all of that, but for the life of me I don't know what it could've been."

She spoke and her voice sounded pathetic when set against his tirade. "Ryu… I'm sorry."

"Don't," he said quickly. "Don't. There's nothing for you to be sorry about." He moved close to her. "I shouldn'tve thrown all of this at you. Expected you to be able to fix it. I am such a -" She thought he might reach out, but instead he moved away again.

"No, I don't think that at all, I - look," she said desperately, "a shooting star."

He looked up at it, then promptly back down. "I need to do something about this," he said. "And about Fou-Lu. He's not going to spend a few more centuries hanging around in a sword if I can help it."

"You could go to Chek, maybe," she said, "and ask the Abbess?"

"Yeah… that sounds good. So after you're all home could you see about-"

"I'll go with you."

He looked up again, to her faint delight. "Cray and your dad and everyone might not be too keen on that idea."

"I don't really care whether they are," she said, ignoring the automatic twinge at her lie. "I want to know if you are."

"It could be a bit… tricky, getting up there again."

"I've been up to Chek once already, you know. I'd be ashamed if I couldn't live through a second time." It was a bit sad, how he so obviously floundered for another objection. "I'm certainly not letting you go up there alone."

Finally, a smile began to form - it grew slowly, but it grew, as he looked to his sword and back to her. "Well, I'll have Fou-Lu with me, won't I?" After they both stopped laughing, he said, "That's fine. Let's work out the rest when we've done with this desert, all right?"

Nina smiled back. "Sure!"

They talked for the rest of the afternoon and evening, without again mentioning Fou-Lu or the Endless. But his words remained in the back of her head, all the same.


	11. The Road Home

Many thanks to everyone who reviewed.

* * *

Chapter Eleven: The Road Home

They reached Shyde that night and Worent the next. The first person Ryu saw when they neared Worent was Una, seated on one of the outer walls with her tail lashing fitfully. She jumped off and ran to them. "Ay, Chief! You're back!" Cray nodded. "Great. Let's go, the Elders've been tearing out their hair." She laughed. "What's left of it, anyway."

Within an hour they were caught in the celebration. People chanted and stamped their feet to the drums, and in between dancing they rushed to be introduced to Sa Ryong (who turned an interesting color at so much attention) and to ask after Elina's health. Elina had significantly improved after a few days back in the land of the living, and the healing had reached her feet - they were still not quite done, but she was able to stand up by leaning on Cray, and with the swirl of her long dress nobody noticed anything beyond a slight limp - which was only natural, they said, after all she'd been through.

"Don't you want to dance? This is a party."

"I don't know," he told Nina, looking past her at the chanting and the stamping. "I'm not good at that kind."

"I'm not either." She smiled and her wings arched. "So we'll make our own. Come on." By the time he could think of another protest she had him by the hands and spun around, carrying him with her. He laughed, but as Mami's bell jingled at chest level he couldn't shake the feeling that Fou-Lu was looking over his shoulder - that or hanging in the sheath tied to his belt. Whichever one was worse.

Ryu focused on Nina's smile and on the movement of his feet, and consequently was able to forget for minutes at a time.

When the celebration began to slow down Cray and Elina went to have a discussion with the Elders and the rest of them got free beds in the inn. The first thing Ryu did was take the bell from around his neck. He held it up and watched it swing on its cord and glint in the lamplight -

_I canno' stand t'see ye look so sad. _

He proceeded to twist the cord several times around the hilt of his sword so that the bell was pressed against it, still gleaming. After that, Ryu slept immediately and without any remembered dreams.

* * *

"Oh!" the man at the Astana gate cried. "Is that you, Captain Ursula?" 

"It's _General_ Ursula," said one of her accompanying soldiers.

"Ah, sorry about that." He looked genuinely sorry. "Congratulations, General. You'll be wanting to see about… Lord Yuna, right?" She nodded. "Thought so! Come on in with your men." He ran into the city, shouting the news.

It would be easy to be indignant about the rebellion, she thought, if only they weren't so polite about it. A trap of false courtesy, in which one was welcomed in, surrounded by smiles, and then stabbed to death, would be fine. Traps could be dealt with, and she ordered the soldiers to be on alert. But during the entire march to the Carronade facility there wasn't as much as a thrown cobblestone. There were in fact a few cheers and eager inquiries from the otherwise serene populace; a few of the rumors regarding her deeds were so outrageous, if oddly flattering, that she took note of them to bring up later.

An Imperial Thaumaturgist, presumably the leader, greeted her at the entrance. "General? Oh yes, there would be a lot of shuffling about, wouldn't there? Do come in." She acquiesced, but once inside she firmly declined a seat.

"Where did all this nonsense about the Wyndian princess come from?" she asked. "I never laid eyes on her, and I certainly don't think he intended to turn her over to the Alliance after he was done."

He coughed. "Ah, well, there _was_ a bit of exaggeration." When she let her fingers edge toward her gun he said quickly, "If I told them he'd gone and done something to some Alliance princess, do you really think they would have cared? We have been at war, as you know. They'd hardly have thought it deserving of what he, well, deserves."

She frowned. "If he's as guilty as you seem to think, why prevaricate?"

"Look, I know he's been doing something wrong, even if I can't point to the exact law, and I hardly wanted to wait and figure out exactly what he'd done and then find he'd caught on and run away again."

"They're saying out there that it was the people from the Alliance who captured him." Of course it had to be them - they didn't live in the Empire, they weren't diplomats and they wouldn't give a damn about who would be offended if they locked up the Minister of Thaumaturgy. She wished she were able to be like them in this respect.

"Yes, but how do you think your soldiers, that Norris and Pasho, would have reacted if they'd roughed up an Imperial official and dragged him out of the Base? Speaking of which, I gather it turned out the princess was still alive, if a bit legless, and she's gone back to the Alliance with them."

"I see. So where did you put Lord Yuna, then?"

"Ah. Well. He's escaped."

"Escaped by being piked in the head and thrown into the aqueduct, where he swam away?"

He chuckled, but stopped when he saw the expression she must have had. "Escaped in the commonly defined manner. He went through the Causeway before we got wind, but we've caught the man who helped him."

"Why the Causeway? He can't expect to be very welcome in Alliance land."

"The man mentioned a place in the other land where gods were summoned."

Ursula nodded as she remembered conversations with her new traveling companions while they camped in the highlands near the village of Chek. "I think I know what was meant by that."

"Would you like to speak with him? He's been understandably reluctant to talk."

"Yes, I think I'll do that. You realize I have to arrest you for this."

"Certainly, General. Procedure must be followed."

* * *

Yuna had talked and spent his way onto a merchant's sandflier bound for Shyde, describing himself as a scholar come on a peaceful visit to the Alliance. It was true - he'd not brought any soldiers with him, had he? A group of Alliance soldiers stood near him, though the deck was quite roomy. In their center was a young man with the same petulant expression as Soniel had often worn when he still had a head, who Yuna gathered was a Ludian prince. They bent their heads toward each other and conversed in false whispers; for Yuna not to hear them he would have to have his hands stuffed down his ears. 

"Look at his _hat_, I tell you. Look at his face - it's powder white. I'm telling you, he's _that way_."

"You mean he's an Imperial mime?"

"Imperials… half of them bloodthirsty bastards and the other half-" Presumably not mimes.

The voice lowered to a point where it was obvious they actually didn't want him to hear. But he'd had a good deal of practice with his assistants. "I say we wait until he goes to sleep and then pitch him off for the Sand Dragon to eat."

"The Sand Dragon's run away, idiot. We were chasing it until the flier got busted, remember?"

"Oh. We were? Damn. Those were some big dogs, weren't they?"

"You bloody fool," said the prince.

"But I still say we pitch him off the side," the fool/idiot persisted.

"Look, we're not _trying_ to restart the war."

"We aren't?"

Typical military high spirits, Yuna decided. When in the vicinity of the Generals Yohm and Rhun's men he'd often heard much the same sort of thing, applied to a variety of targets. Nevertheless he didn't sleep until all the Ludians had gone away to card games and the like. Just to be safe.

* * *

The next morning Ryu slept late, as usual, but not as late as Sa Ryong, who eventually needed to be hauled bodily from his nest of blankets. As he retied his ponytail Nina came in, followed by Deis. In the last few days Deis had grown out of the child's body and child's voice and now, apparently, judged herself worthy to be seen away from the Ershin armor. She had half a sweet bun in her hand and the other in her mouth, which she hurriedly swallowed. "This isn't bad at all," she told Ryu. 

"What, the bun?"

"No, all of this." She waved a hand along the length of her floor-sweeping blue ponytail and grinned. "You really knew what I wanted, didn't you?" He shrugged, at a loss for a reply.

Cray met up with them outside his house, where he gave them the news regarding Tarhn. "They got a message by bird," he said, twining his hand with Elina's. "It said she was going to Wyndia with the Grass Dragon and not to wait for her. Let's get going."

The journey across the Gold Plains was a good deal faster than it had been the last time, to everyone's relief. They went on foot - only Cray and Ryu could ride. Deis ran ahead, her hair alternately blowing out with the wind or dragging through the tall grass, and her laughter had stayed that of a child. The pathway through the shrine out into the Wyndia region hadn't changed, though someone - Tarhn? - passing through before them had left the laser beam puzzle in its proper configuration, saving them some time.

Throughout all this they were attacked several times by roving monsters, as was expected, but to Ryu's guilty relief Fou-Lu utterly failed to shout at him in the middle of a fight, or indeed to say anything or manifest himself at any other time. If the others hadn't seen… whatever had happened to his sword, he might have thought that they'd inadvertently left Fou-Lu's spirit back in Kyoin.

But at least there was no more memory leakage. He had only to deal with what had already managed to get in, though that wasn't that as easy as it sounded. He shouldn't have been surprised - many of them were not, after all, the sort of memories that were easily forgotten.

* * *

It was dark by the time they crossed the Ahm Fen the next day. Ryu sat first watch, and when he still wasn't tired he shared the second with Scias. When Cray came on for third, Ryu ended up being forcibly dispatched. "I'm not tired," he called one last time, then undid his sheathed sword, still with the bell. He set it to the side of his bedroll and pulled his blanket around him.  
_  
As for her - she is dead. There is nothing. _

Ryu lay down. _Yes. There might not be nothing, but it had to have been awful. They hurt her to hurt you. _Fou-Lu couldn't possibly hear him from the sword. He didn't care. _Like they would have hurt Elina to hurt Wyndia. Everyone dying, dying… it's not fair. It shouldn't have been like this. _

From here he could see the sleeping forms of Nina and Elina, wrapped in their own blankets, and he was comforted. That, at least, was set right.

_I know it sounds silly, but I swear, Ryu, she's breathing. _

_If I'd brought her back on accident what could I have done on purpose?_

He smiled as he was struck with the serenity of the utterly absurd.

_What I could do on purpose? I could bring her back. I could bring Mami back. _

_It might be different than for Endless - but Elina wasn't a real one, and she was mortal before that anyway. I haven't got the power anymore - but I can get it back. I rode on it to bring her back all the way, I'd better be able to do it again. The Abbess has got to have at least a hint._

His smile widened. _And Fou-Lu couldn't possibly want to die anymore, when she's here for him to come back to. _

_It's worth a shot. It's worth it to try and fix what got broken. Better to bring them back than to muck about with revenge. People can only die once but life…_

When he finally slept his dreams were vague but pleasant, with an utter absence of bells.


	12. Associations

* * *

Chapter Twelve: Associations

They were ushered to the dining room of the castle on their arrival. The dirt of days of travel still clung to them; nobody seemed to mind. Cleanliness might well be next to godliness but there was something on godliness's other side.

Nina's father sat at the head of the table; on his right Elina conferred with him, with an occasional whispered addition from Cray. As usual Nina sat at her father's left, with Ryu next to her. Their other companions were scattered along the length of the table in between, except for Won-Qu and A-Tur, who took two corners of the room. People kept giving the latter two apprehensive looks, despite Ryu and Nina's reassurances - it would take a while for most Wyndians to trust anyone from the Empire, and it had been a job getting the guards to let them in at all. Tarhn sat next to Cray, and the Oracle of Wind sat near the foot of the table with three who once were Endless - P'ung Ryong, Ch'o Ryong, and Sa Ryong. P'ung Ryong had the form of a Wyndian, while Ch'o Ryong possessed a Woren's tail.

Conversations ricocheted about between those attending; the most private ones were at the head and foot of the table. At the head, it was her father, Cray, and Elina. Nina gathered it involved Elina's betrothal to the Ludian prince - it was unlikely to go on for much longer, considering both the sandflier chase and the entire debacle with Cray and the King's Sword.

At the foot, the participants were the dragon trio. They bent their heads together - for a while it seemed as if they were discussing Ryu, but now it looked as if they had changed their focus to the food. As she watched, Sa Ryong got a forkful of the special salmon from a nearby platter and slid it into his mouth as the other two looked on. He chewed for a second and his eyes popped - a diet consisting mainly of pan-fried sweetfish, bread, beans, and water, as well as bits of the blander Worent cuisine he'd tentatively picked from the food tables, would hardly have prepared him for the castle cooks' spiced extravaganzas.

As he recovered Nina realized that what with all her watching she hadn't spoken to Ryu since they'd sat down. Then, when she shifted her gaze, she saw that he'd been watching them as well. She waited for him to turn back to his plate before she started up their own conversation, which was soon moving as quickly and merrily as the others.

* * *

The Imperial scholar was definitely hiding several agendas one under the other, Master Ilgor of Ludia decided within minutes of their introduction, but for once the fool prince was right. He could be useful. 

The name of Lord Yuna had come up in the negotiations following the capture of the Woren chief and the Wyndian princess in Astana - he was the Imperial Minister of Thaumaturgy and a favorite of the apparently-late Emperor. And now, here he was talking blithely of goodwill among nations. _You'd think they'd have the sense to send someone expendable. Though perhaps now… he is. _

"North of here? You do mean the highlands?"

Yuna nodded. "Yes. It is alluded to in myth as a place connected to the gods. Clearly it would be of extreme historical significance, and may even offer clues as to recent events."  
_  
Extreme historical significance? Oh yes, you play it well. _"You propose to pay it a visit, then?"

"Ah, well, that would be it."

"Surely someone of your high stature should have some sort of guard," said Ilgor. "The path up Mt. Ryft is quite trying, and its sister mountains are hardly an improvement."

Yuna's subtle stiffening told him a bit more he hadn't been sure of. "I was not aware," he said at last, "that the journey would be so harsh."

"If it weren't," said Ilgor, "there would be pilgrims flocking to it and I could simply advise you to join the next group. As it is… I'm afraid I'm obliged to provide some protection for you." He readied and fired his verbal spike, then smiled to give it a good twist. "We wouldn't want you to go up there alone and disappear like that unfortunate Wyndian princess, would we?"

Even stiffer. "I suppose not."

"Although," he prodded, "I'm afraid our brother nations will hardly be enthusiastic about this venture."

Yuna contemplated the tabletop for a minute before saying, "Well. Why tell them?"

He faked polite scandal. "They _are_ our allies - but then it would be better not to promote false hope, would it not? And should you succeed, it will be far less difficult to object to a _fait accompli_, especially if it benefits the Alliance as a whole. You may even," he said, "be able to request new accommodations in the treaty for this."

_It won't be as if he'll have a chance to actually request them. An eye for an eye - I'll have my work cut out getting that fool prince a new fiancée. _

* * *

P'ung Ryong said, "Thou wouldst defy the laws of nature?" 

"I guess so, yeah."

After a much-welcomed bath Ryu had been given a room to himself. The thoughts that had occurred to him that night had been banging around in his head like the drums of Worent, and he needed to let them out someplace. He hadn't wanted to mention it to Nina; he'd thrown enough of that at her already. When P'ung Ryong had shown up at the door, asking to talk, he'd immediately consented and proceeded to let loose his barrage. He should have expected a reaction.

"Thou art young. 'Tis understandable that such ideas might occur to thee."

"Is it that you don't think I can do it or that you don't think I should?"

"'Tis both. With thy powers as the Yorae Dragon gone with the rest of ours, thou hast little means to do so. 'Tis just as well." After a pause, he elaborated. "'Twill bring thee back to the position so detested by thine other half. Even if thou art no longer Endless, shouldst thou bring more between death and life 'twill make little difference to the people. Thou wilt not get a moment's rest."

"You're talking about what would be inconvenient for me, not what would be wrong."

"I understand the Wyndian princess 'twas unintentional, and verily 'twould hath be a terrible thing to leave her in between. Thou wert in the right regarding that matter. But to deliberately seek to do such again? They - _we_ art dubbed 'Those Who Pass' for a reason."

"It's not as if I want to make people immortal. Or are you saying that's a side effect and Princess Elina's going to live forever now?"

P'ung Ryong shook his head. "The borders between life and death wert made to be respected. To bring back those whose time hast passed… 'tis unnatural."

"But I'm talking about people whose time _hadn't_ passed. They were _killed_. That can't be right."

"Ten thousand and more people in this world hath died young - dost thou propose to bring them all back, should the power to do so return to thee?"

"I was only thinking about a few. I'd understand what you mean if I was talking about, say, all the kings of Wyndia, 'cause the castle would get a bit crowded." P'ung Ryong actually smiled a little at the image. Ryu pressed his advantage. "But I'm talking about people who died not so long ago at all - people who got caught up with me and Fou-Lu and died because of that. And I shouldn't think that because I can't do it for everyone I shouldn't do it at all."

A sigh. "No… thou wouldst not see." He looked at the Fou-Lu-sword, with the bell still wound to it. "Regarding thy other half-"

"I'm not going to kill him."

"'Tis not murder. How canst thou murder thyself?"

"I told you and I'm telling you, he's not me." _Why did I ever open my big mouth? _"It's been centuries - we're not the same person anymore."

P'ung Ryong nodded, acknowledging this. "So thou wouldst return him against his will if thou hath the means?"

"I don't think I can, really." Ryu shrugged. "But if this works out he won't be against it so that isn't going to be the problem."

"Wilt thou explain to me how that might come to pass?"

"I told you. It's because of her - because she's dead. So I've got to bring her back. It's that simple."

"'Tis far from simple. Even with thy powers regained, which is unlikely in and of itself, 'tis near impossible thou wilt know how to proceed."

"If I can do it on accident I can do it on purpose, can't I?"

"I would not be certain of that. 'Tis a capricious thing."

"Anyway, I'm going to Chek."

P'ung Ryong lifted his hands and spread the fingers. "I canst not stop thee. I canst only advise against it. 'Twill bring trouble to thee."

He forced a nonchalant smile. "Doesn't everything?"

* * *

Ch'o Ryong sat on the edge of the fountain in the castle courtyard, contemplating the two neat rows of transplanted shrubs. "What was the nature of thy discussion?" she asked P'ung Ryong without turning around. He described it to her. "'You believe," she said when he had done, "'tis for him a matter of genuine altruism?" 

"Yes, I believe so."

"But 'twill lead to trouble."

"I didst tell him as much." He added, "I believe that in light of Sa Ryong's tale, 'twould be wise to confirm the safety of our other compatriots."

"Yes. We shalt discuss it with the king on the morrow."

"Why should we not discuss this now?"

"Another night 'twill make small difference."

P'ung Ryong half-nodded before he remembered. "But we art no longer those who endure. Far more of significance might come to pass in a night now that we art mortal."

"I suppose thou art correct." She stood. "We shalt discuss it now."

* * *

It was with satisfaction that Nina chose the most impractical of the clothes laid out for her - yellow silk with enough rosettes and ruffles and ribbon to stock a small tailor's shop - and wore it as she waited for P'ung and Ch'o Ryong's audience to end, had words with her father, greeted an incoming Elina, then circulated the castle to check on her friends. She came to Ryu's room last and knocked. "It's me." The door opened immediately. 

"That's a nice dress," he said when they were seated on opposite ends of the bed.

"Thank you."

"Are you sure about Chek?"

"Of course I'm sure. Do you think I'd bring it up and then not go? I asked about it," she said, "and he said all right. Eventually." She didn't mention her father adding that if Ryu couldn't come back without her he shouldn't come back at all.

He looked down. "Okay, then…"

"Something wrong?" she asked, though she already knew.

"It's like this. You know whatever I did with Elina?" She nodded. "Since I'll be getting it back anyway-" Nina refrained from asking how he knew there was a way to regain his powers. That would be exactly what he didn't need. "- to get him out of my sword et cetera, I thought I might as well bring Mami back, too. And all those other people, while I'm at it. General Rhun, and the people from Chek…"

Nina edged closer to him. "That sounds like a good thing to do." _If you can_, she didn't add. "What's the matter with that?"

"Maybe it's not right. Maybe it's something I oughtn't mess about with. Making people not dead anymore." He clenched his hands together; his fingers locked. She hated the sight of it. "What do you think?"

"Umm. Whatever you think is right, I guess."

He stared at his whitening knuckles. "That isn't much help."

"Oh, I know - but I don't know what else to say!"

"I'm sorry. Please. Don't worry." This time he was the one to edge closer, and he made to lay a hand on hers. She was grateful that they were no longer locked together. "I don't think I know either."

Nina accepted his hand and looked up at the images formed in the cracking paint of the ceiling. Now she regretted her extravagance - what must he think of her, the spoiled princess-doll in the silk confection?

After a few seconds she dared to look back at him and to speak again. "Actually… actually I think you should go ahead. I mean, they shouldn't have died. I _know_ it was right for you to bring back Elina, and if it was right for her why shouldn't it be right for anyone else? It would be wonderful if you could bring them back like you did her."

He blinked once, twice, three times. "Thanks." He smiled. "'s good to know you think that."

"It's nothing."

"It's something."

"I guess it is…" His hand was warm against hers. "How is it you know just what I mean?"

"I don't know, exactly. I think it's the way you are. You're so… open. And pretty," Ryu added quickly, then looked as if he regretted saying it.

She blinked. "Pretty?"

He looked away from her. "Yes."

"Please - don't do that." He looked back and as he did she turned up her hand into his and smiled. "Thank you so much for saying that."

He frowned slightly. "It was only a word."

"It's the only word I need." Another few inches of edging. "And I've got words for you back. You've helped me so many times…"

"I _do_ owe you."

"Whatever it was you owe me for, you've paid it a million times over. All those times you helped me, and Elina…"

"I told you I didn't mean to do it."

"If you did know what you were doing, you would've done it anyway."

"Wouldn't everyone?"

"Shh. I haven't given you all the words yet. You care so much…" She paused, then added, "And I think you're handsome."

"Really?"

"Yes. And you have the _nicest_ eyes."

"Thanks." They moved closer at the same time and collided in the middle of the bed. Nina made to bury her face in his chest. "Please," he said. "Don't do that. I want to see your eyes too."

She nodded and looked up as their arms slid into position. His eyes shone as their faces moved closer. "Ryu… I think I'm…"

"Yes?"

A wicked thought occurred to her. "… in love… with Scias."

His expression was unadulterated shock. As she hurriedly opened her mouth again to explain it was a joke, he laughed as he caught on. "I thought it was Cray."

She smiled and tipped her head. "What, a girl can't change her mind?"

"You're lucky I wasn't fishing this time around. Do you know how much good lures cost?"

"A thousand zenny?"

"Well, not as much as that, but…" He laughed again and drew her closer. "Forget it."

Next time, Nina vowed, she'd cut down on the dress ornamentation; when their hug tightened and he lowered his head to hazard a kiss, she distinctly felt some of the rosettes start to press into her skin, and the ruffles at her wrists made them itch. In spite of that for a moment it seemed she'd flown through the roof and taken Ryu with her, both of them inexplicably free of the building material they had to have crashed through on the way.

When they disengaged Ryu said, "That was something."

She nodded. "It was." She stood up slowly, hanging on to him until the last possible moment. "Good night."

He continued to sit on the bed, smiling hazily. "G'night."

As she neared her bedroom she ran into Elina. They looked at each other, the both of them smiling slow and calm.

"Cray-?"

"Ryu-?"

"Yes."

"Yes!"

When they were done laughing, they told one another all about it.

* * *

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thanks for slogging through this chapter. Now I'd like to ask you another favor - could you please comment on how I did the Ryu/Nina? I would really appreciate feedback on this aspect - I've written some utter tripe in the past, and I'm working on improving. As long or as short or as nonexistent as you want, but as always, please review. Thanks again. 


	13. High Command

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thanks to everyone who reviewed chapter twelve for your opinions on the Ryu/Nina. Nice to know I'm pulling that off mostly OK. On with the show!

* * *

Chapter Thirteen: High Command

Small wonder, thought Ursula, that Yuna had had so much pull with the Emperor - he was a rare animal among the Imperial Ministers what with his obviously functioning brain. Of course to get this far they - or their relatives - had to have had a modicum of sense, but nobody said they had to show it. 

The Ministers of Education, Agriculture, and Justice showed up on time - three out of six wasn't so bad. The Minister of Education was Lord Hikaru, who looked like he would always be on time because to do otherwise would kill him. Lord Hikaru was a little older than General Rhun had been; Ursula had grown up with the other two, Aurelius and Dorsey, though they'd never been friends.

Aurelius took the seat furthest from her, at the other end of the table. His eyes still watered, she noted, and he retained the annoying collection of twitches. She just hoped he hadn't taken up stuttering while he was at it - she'd had more than her fill listening to Scias.

Dorsey was the newest - his father, the previous Minister of Justice, had died of heart trouble, overwhelmed by recent events. While the post was not technically hereditary, those who made such decisions needed no official rules to consult. He arrived with a stack of paperwork and an abridged volume of law. "Our current system - it's in such a state, General Ursula," he said earnestly as he sat down across from her and attacked the first sheet with his pen. "The documented incidents… positively outrageous."

If he'd gotten the post and embarked on his campaign earlier, his days would have been numbered. As it was, he was fortunate.

The Minister of Trade, Lady Miyu, was next. She had with her a case of whirligigs, the purchase of which was probably the only thing she had to do with actual trade. She lined up the whirligigs before her and began to tinker with them, seemingly oblivious to her companions. Last were Diplomacy and Protocols - Lord Jia and Lady Livia. Lord Jia was even older than Lord Hikaru - he could have been General Rhun's father. Ursula gathered that he'd held what had been a sinecure for years before the current peace, and dealing with Ludia in peacetime had him tearing out what was left of his hair and beginning to rival Aurelius in twitchery. Lady Livia dressed in strategically ragged silks, affecting poverty - one of the things you could get away with when you were in charge of Protocols.

And she had to deal with this bunch. Small wonder that Captain Tang had cringed at the thought of it. Lucky him, he didn't have to actually do it.

"We've arrested the leader of the revolt," she began when they'd all settled down. "He's one of the thaumaturgists. Regarding Lord Yuna -"

Lady Livia perked up. "What? What have you heard of him?"

"It looks like he was imprisoned after the revolt-" If it was possible for someone to perk down, that was what had just taken place. "Then escaped-" Up. "And took the causeway to Kyoin." Down. "His whereabouts are currently unknown." Still down.

"They make such charming things in Alliance lands," said Lady Miyu. "I had imported this _quaint _little doll from Wyndia and its eyes-"

"Kyoin?" said Dorsey, without looking up from the paperwork. "Why Kyoin? Kwanso's less than a day's journey even without transport."

"Is he a fool?" Lord Jia did a quick twitch around the room. "There are still rumblings, are there not, regarding their missing princess? What would prevent them from trying to inflict an eye for an eye? Not," he rolled his eyes upward, "that we were responsible for whatever might have befallen the young lady."

"Young Lord Dorsey brings an interesting point," said Lord Hikaru. "Why did he venture to the other continent when there was certainly help to be had in the Empire?"

Ursula had brought her own sheaf of papers and stack of books - no competition for Dorsey's, but they would do. She passed them across the table, except for one slim volume she saved for later, for after she had gauged their reaction to this lot. "Maybe this will answer your question."

Dorsey skimmed the first page, and his eyes widened. He flipped ahead, skimming more at random, then passed it to Lord Jia. The papers and books circled around the table, leaving exclamations of horror in their wake as well as complaints of poor penmanship. They included, after all, signed statements from Yuna's assistants and tracked-down soldiers, describing what had gone on in Astana Base, with accompanying notes by Yuna himself.

Lady Livia was the last to get them and the one who read them fastest, after which she clung to them. "Are you absolutely sure this is authenticated, General?"

"Don't you recognize his handwriting?"

She looked at it again and pressed her fingertips across her lips. "My word! And he seemed such a gentle man!"

"The Alliance found the princess," moaned Lord Jia - she found herself feeling a bit sorry for him, having to eat his words in under an hour as he had. "We_ were_ responsible. They will tear me apart at the next talk, assuming that there will be another."

"Oh dear. I heard they're developing a new sort of amusing machine in Ludia. If we go to war again I'll not get one of them for ever so long."

He glared. "Lady Miyu, this is hardly a time to be concerned with child's toys." Lady Miyu pouted as if to say that she might as well be a child, why shouldn't she concern herself with toys?

Ursula grit her teeth. "If I may continue? It seems the allegations that caused the trouble in Astana were at least partially correct. There was a hex fired on Soma Forest, and he was responsible for the disappearance of the Alliance princess. So-"

"So he was scared we'd rescue him and then find what he'd done." Dorsey nodded fervently.

Aurelius's knuckles whitened as he gripped the edge of the table. "But why Soma Forest? Of all places? It's not two days from here."

Lady Livia said, "The First Emperor… arrived at the Imperial Castle only a day or two after the date of the hex, did he not?" To Ursula's relief, nobody said anything like, "Are we _sure_ it was actually the First Emperor and not some lunatic thaumaturgist?" The time for that had gone by some days before and hadn't yet returned. She continued, "Perhaps he came here because of it. But still… why Soma Forest?"

In response, she gave them the last book. At first they read and passed it on in silence, for a while beyond exclamation. Certainly what he had done to an Alliance princess was terrible, especially seeing how much trouble it made for Lord Jia, but they saw no problem with what he'd intended to do with her after - they saw no problem with the Carronade, why would they see a problem with an immortal sacrifice for it? It was the kind of thing that they would be indignant about, then write off, water down. This - now this ought to hit them close to home.

Aurelius was the first to speak. "Then this means Lord Yuna attempted to destroy the God Emperor, may-he-rest-" He paused as he considered how appropriate this statement was. "Uh, may-his-memory-endure." Even as he spoke a new wave of gasps and horrified muttering swept the table.

"There is no doubt," said Lord Hikaru. "_Lord _Yuna must be found and brought to trial. Him, and this General Yohm."

Dorsey said, "There seems to be a problem there. We have never had a law against attempted deicide. Nobody has ever tried it before, you see."

Lord Hikaru glared at him over Lord Jia's head. "There is high treason, is there not? What else would you call an attempt to murder an Emperor? The God Emperor, at that."

"Yes… I think that could do it." He cogitated for a moment. "Of course, there is the matter of getting Lord Yuna back into the Empire."

"Well, that should be simple enough." Lady Livia laughed dutifully. "Has not our own General ventured forth into Alliance lands and lived to tell the tale?"

Ursula raised and lowered a shoulder. Dorsey said, "Can you have a force together by, let's say, tomorrow at dawn?"

Just when she began to have a little faith in their intelligence a statement like that blew it all to pieces. "You think they'll be ready with flowers and congratulations on the other side of the Causeway?"

Lord Jia blinked rapidly. "What do you propose then, General?"

"The main problem will be catching him. And a great clunking troop is not going to be able to do the job. I should be ready to go by tomorrow morning."

"Well said!" Ursula doubted Lady Miyu was even aware of what had been said. 

Lord Hikaru nodded. "That is settled, then. Have you not other news, General? Regarding the Imperial succession?"

It was like she'd spun a bowl of goldfish about like a child's top and now was about to toss it over a waterfall. "Yes. There doesn't seem to be any."

In the silence that followed she fancied she could hear each of those assembled mentally counting to ten. Lord Hikaru was the first to finish. "How can there be none? The Imperial family is as a tree with a thousand branches."

"All the branches have been cut off. All of the ones in the records, at any rate."

"He had a cousin in Chiqua," said Lord Jia. "I remember meeting him a few years ago, at a ceremony. A respectful young man, if rather simple."

Ursula sighed. "He was strangled by a boat last year."

"Oh. How… unfortunate."

Around the table thoughts ran at full speed. Aurelius said, "I seem to recall an aunt in Pauk."

"Trampled by a Whelk."

Aurelius blinked. "I'm sorry? I was brought to believe Whelks… hadn't any feet."

"They don't."

"There was a branch of the family in Astana, was there not?"

"A bad blowfish." Expressions of relief - a few of them had themselves lost relatives to bad blowfish. Blowfish was by far preferable to strangling boats and rampaging Whelks - blowfish were within the realm of possibility. You could understand blowfish without disabling most of your independent thinking in self-defense.

Lady Livia said, "Is there any precedent for this situation?"

Dorsey said, "If I recall correctly, the death of the Emperor's heir has generally resulted in a civil war of varying magnitude. However, in such cases there were still distant relations left to wage the war."

Lady Livia nodded. "Oh yes, but there is still the Emperor's mother, isn't there?"

They all visualized the gibbering woman who had been quietly consigned to a country residence during the time of the Twelfth Emperor - the court was well acquainted with insanity, but the discreet variety was far preferred. The Thirteenth had had her visit the capital to witness his ascendance; the incident, or string thereof, was still remembered with some embarrassment even by people Ursula and Dorsey and Aurelius's age, and he hadn't had her visit again. Then they visualized her on the Imperial throne. "No," they chorused, though Ursula thought Lady Miyu's lag of a few seconds rather spoiled the effect.

Lord Hikaru's fingers endeavored to snap each other; even he was beginning to crumble. "What then is to be done? The Minister of Thaumaturgy a traitor… the Emperor dead, without heirs… the God Emperor at least named a successor… completely unprecedented event in the history of the Empire…"

"Of course it's unprecedented," said Ursula. "If it happened before then we wouldn't have an Empire by now."

Lady Livia ventured, "Perhaps a candidate might be found among our-"

"The people would never stand for it." Lord Jia's voice was flat. "If they cannot trust the Imperial bloodline-" _Not that it was all that trustworthy to start with. _"- what will they trust?"

Aurelius was sitting unusually straight, with nary a twitch - she guessed this portended something. She was right. "General Ursula has given us accounts of Lord Yuna's perfidies," he began. "Far be it from me to speak for Emperor Soniel, may-he-rest-in-peace, but perhaps as he had no children, and considering the state of the rest of his family, it was his intention that the God Emperor Fou-Lu, may-his-memory-endure, might assume his position once more. And perhaps Lord Yuna twisted his words to result in the attacks on the God Emperor." 

They were beginning to nod. This they could believe. They couldn't think that the late Emperor was a power-hungry murderer - no, they'd rather think that Yuna had taken him in and that he wanted to chase down Fou-Lu to _ offer_ him the bloody _throne_. Granted, Yuna probably had taken him in, but that didn't automatically make him an innocent victim. It was just as bad as the people of Chedo thinking that because Fou-Lu had been behind the destruction they must have done something to deserve it.

"Good idea. It would be even better," said Dorsey, "if we could find him. Nobody seems to know where he'd gone off to after the, er, the incident."

Ursula opened her mouth to speak, then paused. What she was about to say would surely go to support their happy delusion. But they were right about one thing - the Empire wouldn't go on very long with nobody, not even a figurehead, on the throne. "The God Emperor would be in the Alliance by now. He merged with his other half - the dragon Captain Rasso and I were sent to find in Alliance lands."

"Ah!" Lord Jia said. "I believe I recall something of the sort referred to in this… this unfortunate account." He nodded at the last book. "So perhaps you were dispatched to seek him out for that very reason." _Like hell we were. _ "Might I request the name of his… other half?"

"He goes by Ryu."

Dorsey picked up one of the soldiers' statements and waved it. "Not the same Ryu as in-?"

"The same."

Lord Hikaru drew himself up. "This is hardly following tradition, but I do suppose desperate times call for such measures. General, while you are traveling, be sure to inquire as to his whereabouts, and if he is sui -" He stopped. "Simply retrieve him, General. You know the great import of this."

"I know."

He frowned. "Yes, I'm sure you do."

"Please, General," said Aurelius. "We haven't much other choice."

Ursula nodded and endured another hour of confirming the decision and brainless nattering and questioning about the progress of reconstruction before she extricated herself and retreated. She ran into Captain Tang outside; he took one look at her face and said nothing.

That night in the barracks she wrote a notice of her impending absence, sent it out, then packed before settling down for a few good hours of sleep, which eluded her. If it was possible, she was even more unsure about the idea than when it had first been presented. A position as figurehead of a half-collapsed empire - that was what she could offer him. And while the First Emperor returning would certainly be accepted by the people, the charge of a Wyndian princess would hardly have the same effect.

She groaned and rolled over. _Oh, joy. What have I gotten into here?_

When she finally slept she dreamed of hexes and of General Rhun, slumped against the wall of the Imperial Castle, asking her to again call him grandfather.

* * *

For once Cray wasn't holding Elina's hand. He said, "You'll be fine on your own?"

"I _won't_ be on my own. Ryu will be with me." Cray didn't look very reassured by this.

Deis folded her arms. "What about _us_?"

Ryu said, "What about you?"

"Don't even think of going to Chek without us. If you're going to try and get back your powers there is no way I'll be left behind."

"And w…we're n-not about t… t… t-to l-leave you t-two…" Scias grinned. "A-alone." 

Nina felt herself blush, Cray cracked a smile, Elina giggled, and Ryu turned to examine the wall. "Fine, sure, why not?" he said. "A-Tur and Won-Qu were coming with us anyway."

Deis rolled her eyes. "As if they would've done anything to stop you."


	14. The First Emperor

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Wow, what a turnout! Now let's see if my luck keeps up, shall we?

Alpha Draconis: Yep, people like them in their positions are currently pretty rare.

* * *

Chapter Fourteen: The First Emperor

Scias looked at the latest burned-out match in his hand, then at the pile of distinctly unlit and soggy kindling heaped before him. He grimaced. "I w-wish Ursula was h-here. She… w-was the one with f-fire m-magic."

"Better than that," said Deis, "I wish _my_ magic was here. I'd fry off all the snow and make the biggest lake on the continent. I bet the fishing would be great, Ryu."

Ryu looked up at the rising sun and shivered briefly. "I'd settle for dry wood." Now what had they done the last time they were here, before Ursula had joined them and Deis had regained use of her magic - oh yes, they'd gotten down Ice Peak and into Chek before that had been an issue.

Won-Qu said, "I apologize that we canst do nothing to remedy this, Young Master."

"Don't call me that. Please." Less than an hour into the new day and already he was weary.

Nina rubbed at her arms. She had eschewed her familiar blue dress in favor of a more practical outfit. "What do you think we should do, Ryu?"

"Let's just have some bread and stuff and head for Chek." After a few more attempts and wasted matches, everyone agreed.

Bread and cheese was produced, broken up and passed out. Ryu and Nina climbed onto A-Tur, while Scias, Deis and Ershin took Won-Qu. They rushed north through the snow; the wind tore at their hair and jingled Mami's bell against the sword where Fou-Lu rested.

* * *

"Just one question, ma'am." 

Ursula leaned against the railing of the sandflier and watched Kyoin distance itself. It was by no means the best money could buy, but she would've tried for worse if she had to. Her benefactor was a Wyndian merchant who refused to disclose his name; she was just happy it wasn't that Manillo. "What?"

"What've you come here for?"

He'd given her a ride; she could at least answer that. "Following someone."

"Oh. A man friend?"

She glared at his winged back. After some silence he said, "I guess not. Did you hear about Princess Elina?"

"I heard."

"Ludia's going to have a job digging its foot out of its mouth, eh?"

"I suppose so."

He stopped trying to make conversation after that, which was fine with Ursula. She counted the dunes and calculated how many more they would pass on the way to Shyde.

* * *

"It's good to see you," said the Abbess when they were all gathered in her house with hot drinks. "Might I ask who these new additions are?" Introductions were made, and she angled her head forward slightly. "I see. What can I do for you?" 

Nina dipped her face toward the rising steam from her hot chocolate and lifted her eyes to see Ryu step forward and say, "Do you think Fou-Lu and I could split again?"

She didn't even blink. "Ah. But I see you already have."

He flushed. "Kind of, yeah, but I was wondering if I could get him a new body, because it wouldn't be right, would it, for him to be stuck in a sword…"

"You're right. It would not be." She frowned. "Normally I would call it impossible. If I knew a way, I would certainly have applied it to your friend."

"Of course you would've," said Deis.

"But with the power of the Yorae Dragon it might well be doable. Am I right in assuming that was what restored her?" She nodded at Deis.

Ryu nodded. "Her and Nina's sister, I think. But I don't know how I did that, and it looks like it started up _before_ I threw it away, so…"

"Well, that at least is simple. You'll have to get your power back."

Nina accidentally inhaled some of the chocolate. _And that's supposed to be simple, is it?_ After he made sure she was all right, Ryu turned back to the Abbess. "That's supposed to be simple, is it?"

"There is no such thing," said the Abbess, "as suicide of power. You may well have taken away that of the other Endless-" Nobody asked how she knew this. "- but the most it can do to itself is block pathways of your mind that lead to it. And what can be built can eventually be destroyed." She frowned and took a few steps closer to him. "May I?" Ryu nodded and she placed her hand on his. Nina looked on, feeling uncomfortably like a gawking spectator at some show. _Hurry, hurry, see Ryu save the world, only ten zenny. _

Eventually the Abbess said, "They appear to be very well-formed barriers, but with time if we cooperate they will give way." His eyes lit up. "Then you can find out how you gave your friend her new body, and repeat the basic process. We will request Fou-Lu's consent, and then draw him from your sword-"

Ryu looked first up, then down, then straight ahead. "Er. There's a bit of a problem with that."

"How so?"

"He… well… I ran into Fou-Lu in my mind, after I went to get Elina, and he said… he said he didn't want to come back. He said he wanted me to merge with him."

A timely head movement kept Nina from roasting her sinuses again. Beside her came an audible breath from Deis.

"Only I wouldn't," he continued, "so I took him out with me. That's how he got into the sword, you see."

The Abbess blinked. "Knowing this, why do you persist? Understand that I see your point, but I would like to know your reasons."

"Because - because…" Ryu kept staring and speaking to the wall. "Either he lives or I kill him. And if I do, he can't ever change his mind about it. And this might sound stupid, but if we merge… I'll get left holding all his old memories, and there might not be so much room for me anymore."

She was quiet for a moment. "I believe the best thing would be to draw him out and into someone who can hear and speak, and persuade him to this course of action. Perhaps as he recognizes you, you might -"

"No!" He flushed again. "Sorry, but if he comes back in, I'll probably never get him out again. Isn't there someone else?"

"Indeed, there is." The Abbess left without saying anything more. They all looked to the doorway, and waited until, minutes later, she returned with Rhem.

Rhem looked at Deis and her eyes widened. "Are you…"

Deis smiled wide and nodded at her. "Hi."

"Ryu, will you give us your sword?" said the Abbess. Ryu promptly drew it from its sheath and laid it on the floor, then stepped back to beside Nina. Rhem and the Abbess walked over to it and shut their eyes. "Don't worry. This will only be a minute."

After that minute, the sword glowed - if Nina blinked she would have missed it. Rhem stiffened, then fell to the floor beside the sword. As everyone decided something had gone wrong and began to rush to her en masse, Rhem's limbs began to jerk, then push herself up to stand again, and as she did this everyone but Ryu and the Abbess again backed up against the wall. For a moment Rhem's body faced Nina; Nina shuddered as she recognized someone else looking out.

"Ryu…"

It was even stranger than when Deis had done the same thing. She saw the phantom Fou-Lu again, this time standing behind Rhem and looking far worse for the wear. He stared around the room with wide eyes, Rhem's head moving with his, catching a little on Won-Qu and A-Tur, who made no move forward this time, and finally back at Ryu; his lips moved and again his voice issued from Rhem's mouth. "Why… hast thou…"

"I told you," said Ryu. His voice shook. "I won't kill you."

"All things must pass."

"But you don't have to pass yet."

He laughed. It hurt her ears. "If thou dost intend to reawaken our power, why dost thou not intend to aid they who wish for such a boon, instead of me?"

Ryu shrugged. "I don't know. Look, why don't you want to come back? What do you want me to do for you?"

"End this."

"Er. Besides that." The Abbess opened her mouth, then closed it a moment later.

"There is nothing thou canst provide besides such."

She saw the lie, and she knew Ryu did as well when he said, "We don't know that yet. There's got to be something, please, tell us what you want."

Fou-Lu folded his arms and lowered his head; pale and insubstantial strands fell and veiled his face - even ghosts and phantoms followed the usual natural laws some of the time. Won-Qu and A-Tur's terrible muteness made Nina want to shout at them. _Don't you care? _Then she realized, _Yes, yes they do care. It's just that they don't know what they ought to say…_

"I think I know," said Ryu at last. His hands shook. "It's about her, isn't it? Mami. The girl with the bell." With each of the words the phantom jerked as if Ryu had struck him, though Rhem's body stayed still. He continued as if he were only now working it out. "If I brought her back, if I took back her dying, would you be okay then?"

"Thou dost speak as though 'twill be simple as a breath."

"It mightn't be simple, but it worked for Nina's sister." Nina felt like she would choke on her heart.

Another laugh. "A hex dost utterly destroy its sacrifice. Even if thou canst retrieve her spirit, she hast nothing to return to."

"She'll have y- oh, that? I'll have to make something for her, then."

"If thou dost insist…" He stepped forward, and Rhem echoed with puppet's strides. He reached out a hand toward Ryu, who flinched away, then cautiously reached out and placed his own hand in about the right place. "I wish thee good luck, thou who art me." Fou-Lu's smile was bitter. "Thou wilt be in need of it. Farewell."

* * *

Rhem fell sideways and the Abbess dashed to catch her. As this happened Fou-Lu vanished. "Wait!" Ryu called to the air. "Wait, I-" Even as he spoke his sword glowed for another blink of time. "Damn!" 

"He did give you some kind of an answer," said the Abbess as she contemplated the sword. "If I understand correctly - someone close to him died to power a hex, and you propose to return her from the dead to persuade him to allow us to return him as well."

"Yes, that's it, exactly. About those blocks - how long will it take to get them down?"

"Elsewhere, a month or more of intensive work would be needed."

Scias leaned forward. "B-but how l-long w-will it t-take _here_?"

"The magical energies around the site of summoning have not dissipated with the loss of the powers of the Endless - they were needed, after all, to call the Endless here to begin with. Should we go there, those energies will likely quicken our progress to a great extent. We may be done in as few as three days."

Ryu nodded. "The faster the better."

"Do not be too eager to make haste. Retrieving the dead will surely involve a great deal of mental and magical energy- one mistake with such an amount will most certainly have devastating consequences, whether they are within or without."

Ryu shrugged and tried to smile. "Hey. I did it once before. If I couldn't do it again I'd be ashamed of myself."

"As you will. But for now, you should rest."

"And another thing," said Deis. "Have you got a good firestarter by any chance?"

* * *

Ursula slid a few more coins down the counter. "So these people, with two blue and white 'dog things,' came through here two days ago?" 

"Right, miss! Another one over here!"

"And Ludian soldiers came through today."

The man sitting beside her at the Shyde bar knocked back another mug of something dark and bubbly before he spoke again. "Yeah, whole bunch, 'bout twenty, an' the Ludian Master. An' with 'em-" He burped. "This is the stuff!"

Ursula sipped a bit of her own drink and tried to stay polite. "What? Who was with them?"

"Imperial with a silly hat." He waved at the bartender. "Another one, Mister! Said he was on a wossname, a goodwill visit. Some kind of bigshot in the Empire I think. Bit silly of them." He laughed. Ursula did not. "I mean, what with all the yelling about that Wyndian princess you'd think they'd have the sense to not send any of _theirs_ over for a while, yeah?"

"Yes," she said, reminding herself she was incognito. "You'd think they would."

"'Least it all turned out all right for her."

"I guess it did. Do you-"

"An' the Ludian was pretty cranky and they say it's 'cause it took so long for the rest of the council to okay whatever they're doing. Otherwise they would've left a good bit ago."

"I'm sure. Do you know where they were going?"

"Oh, tha's _easy_, miss. To Mt. Ryft." He waved his arm in what was apparently intended to be the direction of the mountain, and almost clobbered the patron sitting beside him. "Hope they don't all freeze to death up there, yeah? Don'tcha think so, miss…?" She concluded after a silence that he meant to be "subtly" inquiring about her name. She deliberately misunderstood and slid him still more coins, and as expected he was too busy thanking her and quaffing his next mug to ask again.

Ursula picked up her one bag, left her drink behind - she couldn't afford a muzzy head now - and made for the north road out of Shyde. At least it would take time to get so many soldiers across, and most or all of them had never crossed Mt. Ryft before. Night was falling, but what did that matter? She wasn't tired, and with luck the gap would be closed by dawn.


	15. Gathering

AUTHOR'S NOTES: As always, thanks, and I hope to hear from you again.

* * *

Chapter Fifteen: Gathering

"We're here," said Rhem at the sight of the end of the passage. Her voice retained extra breath from their efforts with the rising columns in the last room.

"Mm-hm," said Deis, "here we are," though it wasn't as though they could have forgotten the sight of the place.

Nina turned. "Ryu? You're ready for this?"

He nodded. "I'm going to do it." Pause. "Have you got anything for her to wear, in case? Shoes and things?" She showed him the several changes of clothes stowed in her pack with relief - it would be a fine thing if she returned in the same state as Ryu and Deis and proceeded to freeze to death. "Thanks."

"Have you got something for him?" she asked, to preclude his worrying over it later. He showed her his own spare things with an equally relieved expression.

"They might be a little short in the leg, but I think they'll work."

"Mm-hm."

"At least cold shouldn't bother him as much."

"You're cold?"

He put the things back and slipped his hand around hers, then smiled. "Now I'm not."

They emerged from the interior of the shrine and gathered at the base of the steps, flanked by Won-Qu and A-Tur. At the top of the steps was the summoning platform with the engraved circle. They all stared at it for a minute more before Ryu finally let go of Nina's hand, detached from the group and walked up the steps. The Abbess trailed behind him for a while, but stopped at the edge of the circle. He continued into the center of the circle, then knelt, drew the sword and laid it down before him as he had done in Chek; the bell tinkled once. He reached down; with his back to them they weren't sure what he was doing until he lifted his hands with the cord tangled about them like a cat's cradle and the bell gleaming in the fading sun.

Ryu untangled the cord and lowered his hands to slip it around his neck, the only sound that of the shivering bell, then raised his hands again and held them there, his head tipped back.

Before Nina could persuade herself to continued quiet she called out, "Good luck!"

For a moment he faltered, but then he nodded and seemed to add her voice to his unseen forward motion.

Scias whispered, "G… g…g…" His voice rose. "G-good l-luck…"

"I wish you good fortune, Youn…" A-Tur seemed to choke for a moment. "Ryu."

Won-Qu said, "As do I."

Ershin said, "I, too, hope your luck is good."

The Abbess said, "Be careful, Ryu."

Rhem echoed in her own voice, "Be careful."

Deis said, "Don't you dare blow yourself up."

Ryu spoke. It came from a long way off. "I won't."

Nina considered kneeling as well, but it seemed rather ostentatious to do such when she had no part in whatever was going on. Even the Abbess, who had offered to help - she, too, seemed to be left out of the unseen goings-on. Whatever it entailed, in the end Ryu would go it alone.

They were still and they waited. They waited a long time.

* * *

"You okay?" 

"'Tis nothing." P'ung Ryong attempted to get up and nearly somersaulted backward with his fall.

Cray lay down his club (it was, at least, one of his lighter ones, otherwise he'd probably be looking at a major concussion right now) and walked over. "I think that's enough for now."

"'Tis not enough."

"It's enough, if it's not too much. We should get a doctor."

"I hath no need for such." He promptly contradicted himself with his next fall.

"It should all be cleared up in less than two weeks," said Elina later, when P'ung Ryong had been taken off for a lie-down and the two of them were alone on a castle balcony. "It's odd, isn't it. He was our god - and you can blacken his eye like an ordinary person. You can teach him things."

"I didn't mean to-"

"That's the fourth time you've said that. You weren't to know you were _that _much stronger than he was."

He made out the Tower of Wind in the distance. "Sorry."

"Our people should be at those places you mentioned by now," she said after a time. "Except for Hesperia, of course."

Upon P'ung and Ch'o Ryong's request, he'd supplied a list of the locations where they had encountered the other dragons so that it could be ensured Ludia wouldn't try anything like they had with Sa Ryong - or if they already had, to be sure they hadn't been successful. "That's great."

"I just hope something didn't happen to them - it's been more than three weeks, hasn't it? A lot can happen, in three weeks."

He was cold. It was probably the winds. "Yeah. A lot can happen."

Her warm hand tried to grip his chilled one; it ended up enveloping hers. "But things will turn out all right," she said. Her tone was between a statement and a question.

His gaze shifted toward the general direction of Chek. _Everything with Ryu and Fou-Lu, the Endless, Ludia and the Empire… can it turn out all right? _

"It had better," he said.

* * *

After the sandflier had landed in Shyde and before the soldiers had gotten up enough courage to approach him and "request" his presence in Ludia, Yuna had approached a stall and purchased a blank book at an inflated price. In it he inscribed from memory thaumaturgical formulae and data on preliminary experiments and diagrams that would have been incomprehensible to any untrained in the art of Yuna-scribble. He had kept them in mind for days and now he wrote them down for fear that they would leak out if he kept them there much longer. But he stuck with his scribble; he wasn't so deluded as to think that certain people wouldn't read it at the first opportunity. 

The last of the Ludian soldiers emerged from the last of the buildings in the village - Yuna would like to have a closer look at the architecture, when he had the time. "Nobody there, Master Ilgor."

"Ah, _excellent_," he snipped back. The soldier took a few steps backward. "Well, scholar? Any chance your myth saw fit to give more precise directions?"

"Myths are hardly known for their precision. There would not happen to be a map, by any chance?"

Ilgor turned to the assembled soldiers. "Find a map." They scattered back through the doors.

Some time later Yuna pored over the large yellowed sheet one of the soldiers had found. He actually found the spot a good bit before he announced it, but it wouldn't hurt, he thought, to let them sweat a bit. "Well!" he said when the Ludian Master looked on the brink of detonation, "this looks like the place." He gestured, and the other man leaned forward and scrutinized the ink dot surrounded by archaic lettering. "It lies to the southwest."

"Yes, I can see that," Ilgor snipped. Yuna wondered if anyone had told him snippery was best used in moderation. He turned to his troops. "Get ready to move out."

Collected murmurs of complaint were tossed back. One climbed into the range of audibility - "Aw, Master Ilgor, I'm tired, 's getting dark out, can't we stay the night at least?" This became a chorus.

Ilgor threw up his hands. "Fine." He spun toward Yuna. "_You_ have no objections, I hope?"

"None at all," said Yuna, restraining his smile. "It can certainly wait."

That night, finally given an extended span of time alone in a warm place, he reviewed what he had written in the book, then reviewed his prior conclusion and found it valid. The Empire, at least the part that mattered, had turned against him - certainly the incident in Astana was rebellion, but he gathered Captain Ursula had been made a general, and with such morality as Rhun had instilled in her there was no chance she would stop until his decapitated corpse was thrown into the sea of mud, whether the act of doing so was formally legitimized or not. Result being he was cut off from his progress in Astana, except for that which he had been able to remember.

He had hoped it wouldn't have to come to this, but there seemed nothing else for it - he needed a proper model for his planned creation. It would have to be a comparatively minor summoning, of course, nothing as powerful as the God Emperor had been - if there would be that sort of power again, steps had to be taken to ensure the appropriate individuals possessed it. Disposal after its purpose was fulfilled would be difficult considering he had lost the Dragonslayer as well, but it might well have value in itself, if he set it up properly.

Though of course the Ludian Ilgor would hardly be as easy to handle as the late Soniel, but if he played everything right, things would fall in place. They always had. And at last, at last the world would be at peace.

* * *

_Come on, come on, I know you're there. It's all in the mind, she said. Come on. _

Good luck, Nina had said. Don't blow yourself up, Deis had said. I won't, he had said, and he just hoped to get to the point where doing so would be an option.

_If I knew it would've meant this I never would have gotten rid of you. I'm sorry. Come back. Don't leave me._ He closed his eyes tighter. _Think of symbols. I'm breaking an impenetrable wall. I'm smashing a boulder in my way. At least… I'm trying to. _

Behind him there was silence.

_Nina and me. Mami and him. I'm alive and I've got… I've got Nina. He's in my sword because it's safer than with me, and Mami's dead. What's wrong with this picture? If we're two halves then let's have some equality here. _

He could hear the coursing of his blood in arms and legs and chest and head, but he could no longer feel the sun. Had it set, already? Again and again he envisioned a crumbling wall, a pile of gravel. He flung himself against the barriers - he could "see" them, now that he knew they existed - and bounced off in the opposite direction with equal force. At least his mind couldn't bruise. He'd made the barriers himself - one way or another, they had to fall to their creator. At least, they had to in theory.  
_  
Open up, damn you. Damn_ me.

He didn't notice how tired his arms were until they flopped downward. As they did, his fingers brushed against a metal sphere - the bell.  
_  
Why not? A little ceremony might help._ He cupped it and lifted it high again, and felt the cord move against his neck. He shook the bell and focused on the sound. he demanded to the shapes lurking behind the wall and down the path blocked by the boulder. _This was hers, and I'll save her. It would really be helpful if you got those things out of the way now. _

This time Ryu felt the barriers give a little more under his efforts before they snapped him back again. Still, something more was needed. He gathered together the last words he'd heard from the outside and brought those to bear as well.

_Good luck! _

G… g…g… g-good l-luck…

I wish you good fortune, Youn… Ryu.

As do I.

I, too, hope your luck is good.

Be careful, Ryu.

Be careful.

Don't you dare blow yourself up.

And adding itself at the end of the sequence, _I wish thee good luck, thou who art me._

He didn't know how many times it repeated itself before the barriers fell. But they fell. And at the same time Ryu dashed through a symbolic hole in the wall he leapt over a symbolic pile of gravel, and then he kept on running to what he had so quickly thrown away, in a time so long ago.

_All I can say is I'm sorry I didn't do it before and save us all this trouble. But anyway it's going to be all right now. _

I'm going to make it right.


	16. Infinity Revisited

AUTHOR'S NOTES: To Saikan: Sorry I didn't see your review before. Well, he does have reason to be confident. Thanks to you and to everyone else for their comments. Here's hoping this will meet your standards.

* * *

Chapter Sixteen: Infinity Revisited

The doubts didn't come until Ryu was awash in his awakened power, and then they came in full force. More working in symbols - first he'd nearly been knocked down by a great wave that rose to meet him, but instead of drowning he absorbed it like a sponge. Now he was in a room with two golden treasure chests. The contents of the chests would not be required for him to reach his goal, but considering what he had seen he thought it best to open them now. There was a door - the doubts came through it as he worked on the latch of the first chest, his initial giddiness seeped away, and they took appropriate forms.

The Abbess of over a hundred years ago, a little girl with shining dark hair in coiled braids, spoke. "One mistake with such an amount will most certainly have devastating consequences, whether they are within or without."

P'ung Ryong, in his trident-wielding avatar, spoke. "The borders between life and death wert made to be respected. To bring back those whose time hast passed… 'tis unnatural."

Cray, looking somewhat bemused, spoke. "But if the two of you are supposed to be one… then wouldn't it be…"

Nina, clasping her hands together and leaning toward him, spoke. "Nobody's asking you to save the world. Once in a lifetime's enough."

"Who are you to decide such things?"

"Admit it - you just want to go on a power trip. You want to make sure this time everyone knows you're a big hero."

He fumbled several times, then worked his fingers under the lid and lifted. The doubts looked on, unable to stop him, and shouted with renewed intensity. "Oh, shut up!" he shouted back; they continued.

In the chest were eight bright pearls with blackest ink inscriptions - the symbolism, again. He picked up a pearl at random - it was the size of a child's ball - and read the inscription. "Nameless One," he called, and the pearl dissipated in a whirl of light and flew out the open door. He glimpsed the target for an instant as he stood in the center of the village of Pauk and convulsed as the light swept down and into him.

He picked up another. "Hae Ryong." The Sea Dragon, who had once given out blessings to those who wished to travel the water-sea, collapsed onto the deck of a familiar ship. Ryu's guess was confirmed when the sailors Zig and Kryrik ran up shouting.

"Su Ryong." The Tree of Wisdom had gone to the checkpoint south of Shikk and was discussing something with Alliance soldiers. Ryu hoped they weren't Ludian - then, as he reflected while Su Ryong spun crazily, if they were Ludian they'd soon be sorry.

"Ni Ryong." The Mud Dragon was being helped onto a sandflier by more Alliance soldiers who jerked away at the sight of his returned aura- he knew they weren't Ludian when he saw Sa Ryong standing to the side.

"Sa Ryong." Sa Ryong, too, became suffused by his aura.

"Ch'o Ryong." She sat beside Tarhn on the edge of a fountain in the castle courtyard. Her mouth opened slightly and she pressed a hand to her heart.

He hefted the second to last of the pearls and looked straight at the doubt. "P'ung Ryong." Lying in bed with a black eye (how did that happen, Ryu wondered), the Wind Dragon flew nearly to the ceiling before he fell back onto the sheets, and before the Dragon's Eye faded again Ryu saw his face, suddenly free of bruising, as he comprehended what had just taken place.

"Deis," and she looked at where his body lay and she grinned. Behind her Won-Qu and A-Tur blinked rapidly.

When Ryu got the other chest open he looked down at nine crystals of varying colors, one of them a merging of deep cerulean and the orange-red of fire. He identified them in the same moment - these were representations of the immortality of the Endless. Return these as he had the pearls and the nine of them (or ten, it would soon be ten again) would be again those who endured. He reached out to the first -

And a doubt that could have passed for his twin said, "It's not as if I want to make people immortal."

Ryu stopped and lowered the lid. He had yet to do what he had come here to do. And he had to listen to his doubts once in a while. This could wait, he decided. This could wait for some time.

He walked out the door and drifted above himself. He looked to make sure the others were all right, then thought himself westward to the other continent and south and west again until he was above Soma Forest. He thought of her and her bell, and particles rose from the blighted ground and trees and coalesced into a seething mass. _Do you remember what you were?_ he asked what was left, and it said yes inasmuch as bits of hex could say yes. _Good. Be that._ Then he carried the mass to the other continent and surrounded it by a dome of barriers in triplicate. The him that was below had stood up and flung out his arms, and he closed his eyes and plunged back into himself.

He stood and watched the hex being purged inside the barriers. This was the real magic. Incantations and ceremonial music and whatnot were for smaller spells that needed such support. This was the magic that moved the world, and in under an hour the hex had been seeped out and trapped in between two of the barriers. He banished it without even a motion of the hand. The remainder knitted together and began to grow into a memory of what they had been a part of, and before long a human form took shape. None of the inch-by-inch of Deis and Elina; now he had access to the entire roaring reservoir, and he used it.

* * *

Nina lifted her head at his triumphant cry and blinked against the light of daybreak. Then she looked and she cried out herself, waking the others, at the sight of the girl's body lying in a flickering dome and the more familiar one keeping watch. "Oh, Ryu, you've done it!" 

He looked up; his eyes seemed unusually wide. "Not yet. That was just the easy part."

She got out the clothes she had packed, he dissolved the barriers, and she began to dress the body - she had some trouble until Deis got up as well and helped her. When that was finished, she said, "Are you hungry?"

"Maybe after I'm done."

"What else is there to do?"

Ryu nodded at the body. "Remember Elina? That's just a shell for her to come back to. I'm going to go get _her_ now."

If ever his hands had trembled before, now they vibrated. When he lifted them to rub at his widened eyes she had to restrain her shudder. "Can't you at least rest a bit?"

He retrieved his own set of clothes and shoes and laid them out just outside the circle. "I'm not tired. Anyway I couldn't rest if I didn't know if I could do this or not."

Won-Qu took a few steps forward. "Thou'rt surely in need of-"

"I'm not." He knelt in the circle again. "See you, Nina."

And he fell. This time she knew better than to scream.

* * *

Again he dove into the reconstructed body - no physical contact needed this time - into another great light, searching for some hint to the direction her soul had gone. In due time, he found a trail. There was some trouble catching hold of it, but that, too, was done in time. He recognized in it the place to where he had chased Elina's soul. 

She was not there. She must have passed further on. He looked for another entrance; there was none, but a few moments' work quickly opened one.

_Sorry, P'ung Ryong. Oh, who am I kidding, I'm not sorry at all. _

Ryu plunged across the border between the living and the dead.

* * *

P'ung Ryong stood on a balcony and listened to what the wind told him. He twitched his wings; masses of feathers rustled. "He hath carried it out," he told Ch'o Ryong beside him. "Canst we do nothing?" 

She shook her head, sending small crackles of power out around her. "I only hope that he doth find his way out, with or without that which he seeks. Let us go inform thy king of this development."

They ran into Cray and Elina as the latter pair came out of the throne room. Elina exclaimed briefly over P'ung Ryong's quick recovery. The two of them were smiling, and P'ung and Ch'o Ryong looked at one another and nodded as the knowledge seeped between them. "We hath news for the king," Ch'o Ryong told the guard.

The guard said, "Okay. Go on in." He momentarily contemplated P'ung Ryong's wings. "This might sound dumb, but would this be good news or bad news you've got?"

"News," said P'ung Ryong, and stood straighter.

* * *

It was with some relief that Ursula half-raced the Ludian troops southwest. The others were probably at the place they'd told her of, the place Yuna aimed for. She'd have some extra firepower for the inevitable confrontation. And if for some crazy reason they had instead gone somewhere else, for example the abandoned village where Rasso had died, they had some extra time to get out. Win-win either way. 

With some guilt, she hoped they would be there. She didn't fancy trying to take out twenty soldiers on her own.

* * *

"Hello?" 

The shades in the blackness pressed up to him and his light. Most of them were no longer recognizable as the people they must once have been. Some still maintained themselves as outlines, but he sensed they were giving fast.

_You'd think the people who died later would be nearer to the front. Unless…_ He swallowed. _Unless these_ are _the later people and the earlier ones're already… No. Elina held together fine, didn't she?_

"Mami?" he called out. "From Sonne, friend of Fou-Lu also known as Ryong?" The bell - or its representation - still dangled from his hand on its cord. It, too, seemed to glow with inner light. He lifted it and shook it again. "I've come… I've come to get you back?"

"She would be further in. The shades tend to move to the outside. They enjoy greeting new arrivals, as do I."

He turned to see a nearly solid form with sticks of legs and a distinct nose, outlined in magic flames. _A living torch._ "You're General Yohm, aren't you?"

A low bow. "Indeed. And you would be the God Emperor's other half?"

"That's me." He brandished the bell. "Where is she?"

"Further in. She should be near General Rhun."

A phantom in extravagant yellow robes and headdress approached. Ryu identified him as the late Thirteenth Emperor. Blood dripped from an impressive gash in his neck, and Ryu half expected him to take off his head and stick it under his arm. "I say… what is it, General?"

"We were discussing a young woman," said Yohm. "I believe he proposes to resurrect her."

"Was she important?"

Ryu thought of the Dragonslayer wound. It hadn't been that serious an injury, but it was the thought that counted. "More important than you."

The late Emperor's voice became a whine. "It's not for you to decide! He isn't here. He still isn't here. And after he _told_ me he'd lay down his life for me."

Yohm gave him a see-what-I-put-up-with look. Ryu shrugged in return - Yohm was hardly innocent either - and continued. There were no pathways here, and the trail he'd followed in was quickly lost, but he called for her and sounded the bell and eventually she came to him.

As fading went Mami was almost as near-tangible as Yohm - she was beginning to go a little fuzzy round the edges, but that was it, to his relief. Her hair had come loose and fallen over her face; no ethereal bell adorned it now. Her clothes were torn and he could see half-scabbed wounds on arms and legs. _From when they got her ready for the Carronade._ She reached out and he took her hand. To his relief, it didn't go through his. She smiled through the veil of hair tangled with insubstantial caked blood.

"I heard your calling," said General Rhun as he came up beside her. "I thought I might have a look." He looked even closer to real, but like the others his cause of death lingered in the dried blood on his uniform.

Maybe the spirit-Ryu was more linked to his physical body than he thought - why else had his throat gone dry? "Should I come back for you later on?"

In return he got a gaze that made him feel like squirming in spite of everything. Then Rhun's expression shifted to… concern? Why concern? "I thank you for your offer, but I doubt it would be the best thing."

"All… all right." He swallowed. "If that's what you want. That's fine, then."

Rhun eyed him again. "Good luck."

"You too," he said. "Er. Goodbye." He began on the way out with Mami in tow before he could feel any more foolish.

When they were nearly out a crowd emerged from the shadows and made for them. He thought they were shades, then saw how distinct they were. _Children. No, not children exactly. _"I'm sorry."

"There's nothing to be sorry about," said the one in the lead. Unlike the other spirits, they were surprisingly free of injury. "You couldn't have known they'd find the other village."

"You want me to come back for you later?" he offered. Even as he said it he guessed their response.

They gave them the same look as Rhun had given him. "No, no," said another of them. "We'd hate to trouble you. We passed on even before her-" As one they indicated Mami. "And we might not like how it came to pass, but this is as it must be."

"It doesn't have to be."

"You are tired," they said. "Think of the living first. Rest and then consider it again." They turned and faded back to the blackness.

"I'm not tired," he called after them.

After they were out of sight she said, "Yer bringin' me back?"

"Yeah."

"Why're ye doin' all this for me?"

"For Fou-Lu."

"Eh? Mm, ye be right, that be his real name." She nodded. "That general… he did say so. Only he also said about desecrating and what-not… but that part weren't real, were it?"

"No. It wasn't."

"Is he… is he goin' to be there, then?"

"He'll be there if I've got anything to say about it." Ryu spotted the telltale flames in the middle of a group of shades, and again his phantom throat felt parched.

But if it was a last-minute effort at undoing the results of his journey Ryu expected, he was disappointed. When they approached, Yohm merely nodded at them and beckoned them onward. And they went onward.

He heard a surprised gasp as they crossed the border and went into her light. _Stay here. Reacquaint yourself. We'll be seeing you in a minute._

_Oh… all right, then._ He left her and returned to the sunlight, now much brighter. She jerked, her eyelids fluttering as Elina's had; Ryu sensed her soul bonding to her body again. He nodded at the reawakened and wide-eyed group and moved to the sword, still lying in the circle of the platform alongside his own collapsed self.  
Compared to what he'd just done it was child's play to extricate Fou-Lu, and within a minute they both stood in the circle. The others seemed torn between staring at them and asking questions of Mami. He heard her voice come haltingly, words tripping over each other, running more smoothly as she became reacquainted with speech.

_Thou hast done it, then. _

Yeah. Yeah, I've done it. Now… now is it all right?

Thou hast done it.

I have. Fou-Lu…

He smiled. _Say no more. Thou hast given me the impossible. 'Tis only just that I capitulate to thee at this juncture. _

_So are you okay with coming back now, then? _

Of course.

Okay. Let's do it.

A sudden frown. _Art thou certain?_

_Why wouldn't I be?_ With that Ryu sent a steady surge of power in Fou-Lu's general direction. Fou-Lu caught it easily and began to knot it into a familiar pattern, though still with a look of misgiving. _Mind the clothes!_ Fou-Lu shifted himself to the appropriate location.

With them working together on the weave, it was done in a half hour. As they did this, Ryu felt half of the Yorae Dragon's power flow to Fou-Lu - _Now we're even_, he couldn't help thinking. Aside from the predicted shortness in the pant legs, the clothes fit quite well.

_'Tis time to return ourselves. _

_Yeah. See you, Fou-Lu._

_The same to thee…_ And Fou-Lu smiled again as he began to fade. _Ryu._ When Fou-Lu's eyes opened Ryu, too, slipped back.

He opened his own eyes to a clamor that seemed rather louder than before, with a blur drifting above him. He blinked several times before it affixed itself to a stationary position and turned out to be Nina. "You're back now?" she asked. He nodded and sat up. "You're not going away again, are you? There's nothing el-" She shook her head. "Not so soon?"

"No, not so soon. So that's fixed." An invisible band played the drums of Worent on the inside of his skull. He pressed a hand to his forehead. It didn't help.

She nodded absently. Won-Qu and A-Tur had gone to greet Fou-Lu, and now they walked on either side of him as he made for where Deis, Ershin and Scias helped Mami remember how to walk. When Mami caught sight of him she remembered how to run. "Are you feeling all right?"

Ryu opened his mouth to say "I'm fine." No words came out. He tried again - still nothing.

_Then, I'm not fine, am I? _

The waves had returned. They dragged him down and he was so tired now he couldn't fight. He reached for some hidden reserve of strength and there was none. "What's wrong? Ryu?" He felt Nina's hands grabbing at his own. "Ryu. Ryu!" As he sank back and was borne downward Nina's voice rose to a frantic cry, and as the black water closed over his head the sun at noon blinded him.

* * *

"It can't be so bad," said Nina. "It can't be so bad. He's done this before, with my sister, and the next day he was fine as fine." 

"That may be so," said the Abbess, "but as he described it, it was most certainly done working with a fraction of his total power at a time. Also, he still had Fou-Lu with him. I should have realized- the mental strength of one ordinary mind alone could never power such feats. Perhaps the Yorae Dragon had always had abnormally high energy, which was what made it liable to separate as it has."

Fou-Lu held out his hands. "He didst… he didst bestow to me a full half of it. Surely 'twould…"

"The damage had already been done. Trying to keep control of all that power - keeping himself from losing his mind beneath it - it must have utterly exhausted him, and even more energy was expended with all his recent activities. His life force must be drained below replacement. It is likely he will lose the rest before sunrise. At best he will enter a… long sleep."

_Like Fou-Lu, only unless he's gotten immortal too, he'll die of old age before he wakes up. _

Ryu lay where he had fallen, still holding Mami's bell - it seemed improper to take it, now. They gathered around as if at a wake, and if what the Abbess said was right, this practically was a wake, wasn't it? Nina pressed her hands to her face and clutched at her tears. "He told me he wasn't tired."

"He might not have been. Channeling the power would have kept him up, and now that he has done with his tasks and given Fou-Lu his share it no longer does so." Fou-Lu and Deis began gesturing toward the inert form. "No, that won't work. More of that kind of power would only keep him moving until it had completely burned him out." Something occurred to Nina and she raised her hands. The Abbess hastened to add, "Your regular healing magic will have no effect either - this is an affliction of the mind, not the body."

Mami said, "Ye mean… he's dyin' cause of me?"

"I did not intend-"

Nina dropped her hands. "I'm sure you didn't. What can we do for him?"

Her voice came slowly. "Nothing."

Silence. Then, even slower, Fou-Lu said, "Thou art lying. Something hath the means to restore him. But thou dost consider it too terrible for our ears."

The Abbess sighed. "You are correct. You will not like this."

"I don't care," said Nina. "Tell us anyway."

"Yes, tell us anyway," said Deis.

"T… t…tell us," said Scias. "W-whatever it is we c-can t-take it."

The Abbess sighed. "Theoretically, if someone else's life force were to be drained into him - someone else's would not be nearly as efficient as his own, but it would supplement his own life and allow him to recuperate with time."

Nina blinked. "I don't see the problem."

Scias nodded. "L-let's all g-give a little b-bit and that o-ought t-to-"

"No!" Nina flinched and Fou-Lu raised an eyebrow. Rhem looked down briefly, then raised her head high. "I might not be an expert, but I know something about that. With his life as low as it is, if a connection's set up he'll automatically take everything he can from the other end until he's above replacement - it's natural, he wouldn't be able to help it." A nod from the Abbess. "We wouldn't have the time to break the connection before whoever it was got drained empty, or at least as far as he is now. It's got to be a life for a life."

"I think that's a fair price." A second after Nina heard herself she knew it was true, and the next second she began forward.

"W… w… wait!"

Nina looked at the front of the green robe and then up toward the face of its owner. "What is it?"

"If y-you d-do that, w-when R-Ryu w-wakes up and finds out it'll k-kill him anyway." Scias nodded to the Abbess. "L… l-let me."

"Don't! I… I…" Her words faded. "I don't know…" she mumbled.

A-Tur turned to Fou-Lu and said, "If you approve I -"

"'Twill not be necessary. I shall do it myself."

Won-Qu dipped his head. "Master, pardon my saying so, but you doth speak in passion. If you do so 'twould defeat the purpose of his journey, would it not?"

Deis said, "You two. If you won't have other people do it then don't do it to yourself." She looked around at them. "And for the record, I'm not volunteering, all right? I've only got a little more than a week out of that-" She nodded at Ershin. "- and I'm not… I'm not going to… oh, forget it!"

Scias said, "N-nobody's t-told me y-yet why I oughtn't."

They all stared at Ryu again. Nina's eye was drawn to the bell, still glinting in the sun. "There has to be another way. It's not fair."

"No," said the Abbess. "It isn't. By all means, exercise your mind. There may be something we overlooked."

Fou-Lu nodded slowly. "There may be…" He frowned. "Perhaps if-"

A-Tur growled and Nina spent only a moment wondering why he was growling at Fou-Lu before she realized that he wasn't and turned in time to see the Ludian Master emerge from inside the shrine. He stopped and gawked; apparently he hadn't expected other people here. But he wasn't important. Nor were the soldiers that came out after him and lined up across the path, blocking their way out, all with expressions of equal surprise. The figure of interest to her was the man who came out beside the Ludian Master, holding a book.

A-Tur growled again, and this time Won-Qu joined him. Fou-Lu bent down, picked up Ryu's sword, and drew it as he stepped forward, A-Tur and Won-Qu beside him.

Mami whispered, "He were in Astana. He were at th' Carronade when… when I…"

"Yuna." The sound of her voice as she formed the word startled her. "He got away. Again."

_It's not fair. _


	17. Wild Justice

AUTHOR'S NOTES: To Saikan, again: Sorry if I sounded defensive.  
To everyone: Here's another "thanks" for your collections. Now for this chapter. Hope you're not too badly disappointed.

* * *

Chapter Seventeen: Wild Justice

"Ah! Don't swing it like that, you almost chopped off my bloody -!"

"Sorry. Sorry. You hear something?"

Ursula heard and utterly failed to panic. She leaned back into the wall and carefully slid her feet to join the rest of her, and as she did a helmeted head craned, focused past her, then vanished back around the corner. "'s nothing."

"I don't like this. Meddling about with gods and whatnot…"

"Yeah. Yeah, I know. But there's no going back now, is there?"

When the tramp of boots faded Ursula dared to move and breathe properly again. From then on she followed at a distance, never going into the next chamber until she was sure her quarry had left it. Finally, she came to a room with a staircase and a doorway at the top.

As she peeked in, a soldier emerged from the doorway. She froze, but he took no notice of her. Neither did his three companions as they turned and went beneath the staircase. After a time she edged inside, her gun ready, and looked where they had gone. There was another doorway there; she could see them make their way along the floor of the next room, weaving around the bases of columns. She heard a voice from above, presumably the Ludian Master. "You! Down there!"

At the other end of the room one of the soldiers called, "Shall we press this big thingy then, sir?"

"Go on!" Presumably the soldier did. Ursula heard rumbling, a pause, more rumbling, then more sounds from above. "What? They've gone down again."

Another voice - Yuna. "They appear to be linked to some sort of timing device."

"Press it again!"

More sounds.

"Well! I would appreciate some assistance."

"Hold on, then, it should be back down in a moment. _No you bloody idiot _wait for him to get back up!" Pause. "There! _Now _press it."

After a few cries for more pressing, presumably as the soldiers made their way across, someone else said "That's everyone, sir."

"I can see that. You - no, not _again_. Stay there. Move out!"

_Damn._ Ursula ran towards the base of the stairs, up and through the doorway in time to see the back of the last soldier going through another doorway on another platform at the other side of the room. The platforms were on a level with the flat tops of the columns, and she ran forward, leaping from top to top while she stowed her gun, without a thought spared as to what would happen if she slipped. Below her the Ludians assigned to button-pressing duty, after an initial shocked silence, had begun to yell, but that was all they could do down there without ranged weaponry.

As she reached the last column it began to lower, as well as the one she currently occupied. She paused for a moment, then jumped and almost bounced off it towards the edge of the platform. Her arms and chin clung to the edge, and after a few seconds she lifted herself up and stood for a minute, waiting for the fading of footsteps in the next room. She restarted at a steady walk, her gun drawn again. Behind her the yelling had stopped.

The room after was an excuse for a hallway, with daylight coming through the archway at the other end. They were going in single-file, and Ursula thought she glimpsed Yuna's hat near the front. Sixteen, at least, would be slightly better odds than twenty, unless the four back there managed to get back across the room, up, and across again in the time the columns were raised. Still, she'd have to act quickly and aim well. Again she waited for them all to go, then ran forward and halted in the archway.

Outside was a paved terrace sunk into the ground and leading up a few steps to another platform. The soldiers had fanned out across the terrace, facing away from her. Beyond the loose wall of soldiers she saw the short, balding man she'd glimpsed leaving Chek - the Ludian Master. Beside him was Yuna. Neither looked in her direction. Beyond them were the two guardians, Won-Qu and A-Tur, staring at them and growling, and between that pair was the First and God Emperor Fou-Lu himself, in plain clothes, hefting what she recognized as Ryu's sword. Beyond _them_ were the two survivors of Chek, Nina, Scias, a tall blue-haired woman and a shorter brown-haired woman, all gathered around something on the platform; they had turned to stare at the new arrivals. Ursula had the feeling something was missing.

The blue-haired woman said, "First one to make a move gets melted to a puddle."

* * *

The wind that was a discreet whisper on the balconies of the castle became a dragon-roar at this speed. Cray thought his eardrums would blow out and leave him deafened for life before they got within a mile of the place; that was if he didn't fall off and decorate the icy ground with red. Elina was comparatively unaffected. In fact, he thought he could hear her laughter drifting past. 

"We art nearing," called P'ung Ryong. "Be at ease."

"Easy for you to say," he tried to call back, but the wind stole his words and he settled for only thinking it, while tightening his grip. They hadn't gone nearly as fast the last time.

He listened to the laughter and realized it was P'ung Ryong's laughter.

* * *

Yuna said, "Well! This is quite a surprise." 

Nina said, "You stop that! She's not bluffing. And I'm not either. You try doing anything to Ryu and I-" Ursula blinked. That was it - Ryu was nowhere to be seen. And what was Fou-Lu doing with his sword, anyway? "I'll-" She looked past the soldiers and her mouth opened.

Ursula decided this was as good a time as any and began to fire. Two Ludians went down before the rest turned and made for her. Won-Qu and A-Tur moved faster; they picked up two more in their massive jaws and flung them at their fellows. Those were down as well. That made six lying on the ground and moaning. Ten to go.

"Stop that! Do you know what the penalty is for assaulting Alliance-"

"Self d-defense." The Ludian Master turned and glared at Scias with rather more apparent vitriol than Ursula thought was called for. Did something happen between them she didn't know about? Scias went on, "Sixteen is a b-bit m-much f-for sight-seeing."

"Twenty, actually," said Ursula, leveling her gun at the remaining, who clustered, shoving each other about and scrabbling for positions in the middle. "There were four hitting that switch back there."

Scias looked at her over the heads of the soldiers, half of which swiveled around as well. "U… Ursula? Is that y-you?" Ursula nodded back.

"As a matter of fact," said the Ludian Master, "it is sight-seeing. The Imperial scholar has asked to be shown the way to such an important historical site."

"The Imperial scholar is wanted for high treason."

He stared at her. "And who might you be?"

She held back a proud smile as she informed him, "General Ursula, of the Imperial Army. I've come from Chedo to find the former Minister of Thaumaturgy. And I have."

"We were certainly never informed of such."

"You wouldn't be."

Yuna finally turned toward her, with a look of vague surprise. "I was not responsible for the death of the Emperor."

"Not for lack of trying."

"I have no idea what you speak of." His expression was as sincere as it could ever get, with it being him.

"Ah - excuse me?" The brown-haired woman waved. "Are ye sure yer talkin' of the same Emperor?"

"I'm talking about the first," said Ursula, gesturing toward Fou-Lu. "How about you, _Lord _Yuna?"

"I," said Yuna, "spoke of the Thirteenth."

She gestured at the Ludians and they hurriedly stepped away, leaving her with a clear line of sight. "You want a list?"

"That would be appreciated, yes," said Yuna. His eyes moved from her to the Ludians; the Ludian Master threw up his hands as if to shield himself from potential entreaties for help.

"To start, there's complicity in firing the Carronade at Soma Forest."

"It was authorized by the Emperor," said Yuna. "The Thirteenth, that is," he added quickly.

She felt herself smile. _This is fantastic. In both meanings. _"Then there's attempted murder of a former emperor." Behind Yuna, Fou-Lu grimaced. "Since you used the Carronade against Imperial lands, that's murder."

"Actually," said the tall woman, "it's not." She indicated the brunette, who pressed her hand to her mouth and nodded. "Because that's her, you see. Just make it another attempted."

Ursula nodded back. She could get the details later. "Care to confess?"

"I _confess_ to nothing. All that was done, was done with the direct authorization of the Emperor."

"Good luck trying to get your friends at court to believe that." That actually seemed to worry him somewhat.

"Ursula. Wait. It's no use."

Fou-Lu and his companions looked behind them and promptly stepped aside as Nina marched past. Ursula looked at her face and was taken aback; before it had only harbored sweetness and softness. Ursula had never seen anything in her face beyond muted sadness or maybe fright, let alone the diamond-hard anger she saw now. But now that it was here… what a sight it was.

"No use." She seized Yuna by the arm. "You can charge him with anything you want, but it won't matter. He'll get away in the end. He got away from us and he got away from the people in Astana." Yuna squirmed, apparently as unsettled as Ursula by this newfound quality.

"Do you know what he did to my sister?" she screamed at the Ludians. Wide-eyed, they shook their heads in unison, and she told them the same things Ursula had uncovered in the books.

After she had done the Ludian Master said, cautiously, "That is quite astonishing news. It certainly sheds a new light on events. My condolences-"

Nina shook her head. "You were the ones who wrote her off. You can go give them to her herself. Tell her to her face."

"I thought you just said she -"

"What, your prince didn't tell you? Ryu fixed her. And he fixed Mami." She nodded at the brown-haired woman, Mami, who blushed at the eyes all aimed in her direction.

"As a matter of fact, our prince did indeed-"

"And now because Ryu couldn't not try to pick up the mess that he made -" She visibly tightened her grip on Yuna's arm. "He's going to die. While you run away and get away with everything and I'm _sick of it_." Yuna squirmed with renewed intensity, but while Nina's physical aptitude was hardly competition for that of the likes of Cray and Scias, neither was his. She marched up the terrace toward the platform, dragging Yuna with her, as the Ludians backed still further away. "Now you're going to do some good for once."

Fou-Lu turned around, stood there another moment, then set off after the pair. So did Ursula, and as she did the Ludians fled around her back into the interior of the shrine with their wounded companions in tow. A regular procession followed Nina and Yuna up to the platform. Now that she was closer Ursula could see the circle engraved on it and Ryu sprawled inside, unmoving. In one hand he held a cord; strung on the cord was a small golden bell. Nina came up to him and knelt, dragging Yuna with her. Fou-Lu and the blue-haired woman stepped up beside her and knelt down as well. The two people from Chek stared. The gray-haired one - called the Abbess, Ursula remembered - said, "You intend to…"

"Yes. I do." Her voice was beginning to falter.

"Are you sure that is wise?"

The anger began to melt away from Nina's stance. "Not really."

"You will likely regret this later," said the Abbess.

"I probably will." Nina's voice and stance had reverted near completely. She stared at her hand but maintained her grip. "Ryu needs this now. I can regret it later."

Yuna had gone even paler. "What is it that you intend?" _I'd like to know the same thing_.

"If she doth have her way thou shalt die," Fou-Lu told him. The sound of his voice gave Ursula a start. "Ryu… Ryu shalt live as a result."

Eyes wide as they could get. "No. You cannot do this. You would not dare."

Nina said, "I could now. I would now."

"If we consider this a while longer," said the other one from Chek, her with the pointed hat and the goggles, "maybe we can come up with an alternative." Yuna bobbed his head at the sight of a potential ally.

"You said everyone doing a little bit wouldn't work."

"Maybe so, but as you said, there should be another way."

"There is another way." Nina didn't shout; Ursula would have preferred it if she had. "He's right here."

"Hold." It was Fou-Lu again. He went up the steps and took Yuna by his other arm. "There might be such." Yuna obviously hoped this other way did not involve his death.

Fou-Lu shut his eyes. A cry issued from Yuna, then equally suddenly ceased as he sagged, held up only by the hands on his arms. In Fou-Lu's other hand he now held a sphere of intertwined tendrils of deep blue, within which light throbbed. As he contemplated it the sphere and the light visibly increased a fraction. In turn he passed it to the guardians, and it grew a little more with each of them. He looked at the result, nodded, then knelt and pressed it over Ryu's heart. It sank downward bit by bit as if through thick liquid and finally vanished.

He nodded at the Abbess, who took Ryu's free hand. She closed her eyes, frowned, then smiled very slightly and said, "It's gone back up."

"'Tis above replacement, then?"

"It looks like it. A month or so and he should be fine."

"I see." Now Fou-Lu looked at Nina. "Shall I continue?"

* * *

"Pardon?" 

"I hath taken the majority of his life-" He jerked his head at Yuna's still form. "He may still recover. Dost thou wish to rid him of the rest?"

"There's a choice?" Nina looked from Ryu to Fou-Lu, then again at the way her hand tightened on Yuna's sleeve.

"I didst make use of my share of the power to create a simple vessel for his life force to reside. 'Twas a simple matter to halt my extractions before 'twould hath been fatal, and augment it with such amounts from us that art easily renewed. Ryu didst take it from this vessel instead of directly from its source. Now that thou art assured of Ryu's safety, art thou willing to go further?"

"I…"

"He hath done much wrong," said Fou-Lu. He let go of the other arm; surprised, Nina let go of her end as well and Yuna fell completely to the ground, sprawled in a manner obscenely like Ryu still was. His hat came off and rolled a few inches. "I wilt not lay blame on thee if thou dost decide against him."

Scias and Deis lifted their hands and stepped back. After a pause, so did Ursula, putting away her gun as she did. Rhem and the Abbess were the last, and Won-Qu and A-Tur maintained their positions at the base of the steps. Now only Mami was near them, and her hands made elaborate patterns as she cried. _Why is she crying?_

Nina worried at her lips, upper and lower in turn. The hatless head looked unusually vulnerable. "Why don't any of you say no?" she asked them.

"B-because it's y-your decision." Scias paused. "A… a-and, if we s-stopped you n-now, you'd n-never f-forgive us. Y… you ought to b-be able t-to d-decide."

As the wind blew over their heads she stared from Ryu to Yuna and back again. "I said all that because I thought there wasn't another way."

"We know," said Deis. "But now… well, he's not exactly on his feet yet, but he'll live. If you do it now, you'll not do it for Ryu. You'll do it for yourself."

_Not for myself! For Elina… _

Ryu had made it right for Elina. She was alive, back as she had been before Yuna had gotten his hands on her. The same went for Mami, the girl with the bell (she didn't have it right now, but Nina's image of her retained it). But could Ryu erase the memories of what they'd been through? Was payment still owed for that? Was it enough of a debt to justify what she would do?

_Have I decided to do it already?_

She imagined Yuna's blood staining the place where the Endless had been called down. Then what Cray and Elina would say, when they found out - they_ had _to find out. What Ryu would say when he woke up - or what he wouldn't say.

_If you let him live he'll only get away again. _

Nina was breathing as if she'd run a mile. How long had she been doing that? Fou-Lu had gone to Mami and placed an arm around her so lightly and now stared at it as if frightened he would break her.

_And why is she crying? _

"What's the matter?"

Her head jerked up and she shook her head. "'s nothing… Nothing ye oughter be concerning yourself with." The account given by her mouth and that by her eyes conflicted.

_Ursula said high treason. That should be enough to put him away forever. Unless of course he gets away again. _

When would they wake? Ryu hadn't eaten or drunk anything for nearly a day now, he had to have something eventually.

_Did Ryu worry about anything like this when he brought them back? Probably not. There's a lot more you can find wrong with killing people than with helping them live. _

How do I tell people I've killed someone?

"What's the matter?" she asked Mami again.

"I… I…" Nina waited for her to get the rest out. "I canna' stand to think ye killed like this." Mami lowered her head. "Even if it be him."

"It's fine," she said. "Because I won't."

_And that's it, isn't it? I'm a rotten coward who can't stand the thought of people thinking I'm as bad as he is. _

But she didn't want me to. And she was the one who died because of him, wasn't she? Shouldn't what she thinks count for something?

"He's not worth it," she said, as she took a step back. "You can take him now if you want, Ursula. But I'll not jump all the way down to where he is just so I can kill him."

The Abbess let out an audible breath. Rhem said, "Good for you." Scias nodded, and Deis shrugged. Mami looked up and smiled. Ryu, of course, didn't move.

Fou-Lu bowed his head, and she took another step back. But he stepped forward, the arm coming away reluctantly, sheathed Ryu's sword and picked up Ryu himself, over his shoulders, then took the bell from Ryu's dangling hand and tossed it to Mami, who caught it. He straightened up and nodded, and Won-Qu stepped forward to hoist Yuna by the collar as his brother had done in Astana. "We should depart, should we not?"

"Yes - yes, I guess we should." _The wind… there's something about the wind… _

"We'll have to be careful about them," said Ursula. _Not just the wind… the sky… something odd about it… _

Scias nodded. "They'll b-be h-hanging around inside, w-waiting for us t-to g-go b-back, I'll b-bet."

Nina realized what it was and pointed upward. "Look," she meant to say, but before she'd gotten out half of it the arrival of the Wind Dragon made it superfluous.

He was descending fast, and she was initially petrified - _He'll crush us all._ But as he neared his form shrank, revealing the two atop it, and when he drifted past the wall P'ung Ryong was again in his Wyndian form and holding Cray aloft. His wings were much larger than she remembered them being. A little bit away from the ground he released Cray, who had a fair landing. Then Elina joined him with her own wings outstretched. His own feet touched the ground and he surveyed the gathering with an expression of calm.

Deis waved. "Good to see you. You missed the interesting part."

He nodded back. "'Twould seem so. Perhaps 'tis fortunate I did."

Nina stared at the door leading back into the shrine. "We were just going."

"B-but n-not that w-way."

Ursula said, "There's another way?"

Fou-Lu smiled and clasped his hands together. The same aura she'd seen around Ryu when he transformed sprang up around Fou-Lu now. "There is."

Two dragons flew, matching their speed with that of Won-Qu and A-Tur below. The rest of them rode atop this quartet. They all got back to Wyndia before nightfall, with Rhem and the Abbess as their guests.


	18. Calm After The Storm

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Next to last chapter. It's been great.

Airess Byrd: Good to know this fic improved your day.

* * *

Chapter Eighteen: Calm After The Storm

It was not easy to rise from the depths to which Ryu had been carried - certainly not as easy as it had been to sink. But he came up, broke the surface and breathed deep. Once his lungs were purged of stale air, he floated. Waves occasionally broke over him. Sometimes he breathed the dark water and coughed for a time, but sooner or later it was expelled and he continued to drift and rest, regaining his strength. Sometimes a different water trickled down his throat and he swallowed it. When he was strong enough, he opened his eyes. 

His first thought was of the Kyoin inn, the last place he had awoken like this. The inn hadn't had such soft beds, though. He turned and his eyes latched on a winged figure sitting beside the bed, balancing a heaping tray on her lap. "Nina," he tried to say, but something croaking or gibbering would be hard put to include in its ranks emerged. That was fine - he saw now she wasn't Nina, or even her sister for that matter.

The woman who was there started, then quickly dipped cutlery into the contents of the tray and started feeding it to him. Ryu wanted to tell her no, don't, I can take care of it myself, but he wasn't at all sure he could. When he'd cleared the tray the woman said, "You're feeling all right?"

He cleared his throat, already beginning to float again. "Just tired."

"I see. The princess says you're to call if you need anything. You want anything else right now?"

"Not right now…" He closed his mouth and eyes and floated a while longer.

* * *

The next time candles burned on a side table and fire crackled in a hearth, and it really was Nina sitting there. "Hi," he said.

She smiled back. "Hi." She was wearing a dress again. "You burned yourself out, doing all that." Judging from her face it had been worse than simple burnout. "The Abbess says you're not to get too tired again for a while."

"How long's it been?"

"Ten days."

"Since the last time, I mean."

"Much less."

"Thanks," he said after the carrying out of the usual functions and another meal. "For all this."

"It was nothing. We've been worried sick."

"You have?" He stifled a yawn.

Luckily, she didn't think it signified disinterest and continued as she went to stoke the fire. "It was a job getting them to go to bed, especially after you woke up this morning. Oh - Cray and Elina're going to get married soon. They hope you'll be better in time for you to come."

He nodded. "At this rate I definitely will be. Did I miss anything else?" 

"Well, you know how Ursula's a general now? When Yuna and the Ludians came after us - Yuna escaped from Astana, you see - she came after_ them_ and arrested him. Then the Ludians ran off."

"Oh. Good for Ursula. So where is he now?"

"He's in our dungeon. Ursula wants to take him back to the Empire herself, since Mami and Elina and Fou-Lu aren't keen on killing him and they're the ones who've got the right, and she's staying here a while longer because she wanted to talk to you and Fou-Lu about something."

"Really? About what?"

"I don't know. It can wait for tomorrow, can't it?"

"Sure. It can."

This time she was the one to start the kiss. It was even better than the first, even with that one colored by nostalgia - especially as he wasn't being poked by the ornamentation of the confection she'd worn last time. Sleep came soon afterward, but he floated no longer.

* * *

He woke to another tray and another visitor. "Morning, Ursula. Long time no see." She nodded. "You've got something to talk to me about?"

"There isn't an Emperor."

He recalled the phantom. "Yeah, I know. He's dead."

"You don't get it. It's not just him. All of his relatives but his crazy mother - _they're_ all dead."

He pulled the warm tray to him, picked up a fork and speared an egg. "And?"

"The paper-pushers in Chedo got it in their heads that what he really wanted-" She frowned and tossed her hands in the air. "-was to wake up Fou-Lu and name him his successor."

He refrained from speaking until he finished the egg. "But that's stupid."

"I know. Their idea was that Soma Forest et cetera was all Yuna's idea, possibly General Yohm's. Since you merged with him, they sent me off to find you."

"But we've split."

Her lip quirked. "Exactly, so don't get too excited."

"I wasn't excited to start with."

"The way it looks, he'll be the one to go back. People'll have more faith in him than in…"

"Than in some random guy from the Alliance."

"Yes." She was still frowning.

"Something wrong?"

"Yes."

"Can I ask what?"

She'd been waiting for this. "If the people from Chedo are any example - they'll let him walk all over them. There are so many mistakes to make if nobody argues with you." He nodded and she continued. "There'll be trouble. But there's not much other choice, is there? If one of the Ministers or whatnot took power instead nobody besides maybe themselves would stand it all. At least they should tolerate the 'God Emperor.'" She sighed and stood. "He should be around to see you in a minute."

* * *

Fou-Lu took the chair at the bedside. "Art thou well?"

"Yeah. How's Mami?"

Fou-Lu smiled. For an instant it was as genuine as any other Ryu had seen, but too quickly it became wan. "Thy mortal physicians hath declared her hale and well. I hath no reason to doubt their word."

Ryu smiled back, uncomfortably aware how faint his best effort was, as if he were subconsciously attempting to mirror Fou-Lu's expression. "Good."

"I should regard thee with hatred. In doing this for me, thou hast given me another debt I canst never properly repay."

Ryu swung his legs and seated himself on the edge of the bed. "But you don't hate me, do you?"

He contemplated Ryu's knees. "Indeed not."

"There's something the matter, isn't there?"

Fou-Lu looked up. His smile was gone, replaced by a frightening calm. "'Tis nothing of consequence."

"Could you tell me anyway?"

He nodded. "She hath told you of circumstances in the Empire?"

"Yeah. She did. What is it?" Even as he asked he realized.

When Fou-Lu spoke his voice was crisp and level. "They wilt be disappointed." And that was all he needed to say.

A memory echoed between them. Night, in Mami's cottage, and Fou-Lu was talking to her. He hadn't dared give his real name after the incident near Bunyan's house, but he wanted to get it out all the same and so he told her a story, thinking that ought to be safe enough, the story of the incomplete god who came to the earth once upon a time.

_However,_ he'd said, even as he dreamed, _Fou-Lu realized a terrible truth. Even were he complete, he wouldst not be able to fulfill all the people's desires! _He'd continued in the same vein for a while longer before Mami had interjected.

_You were right. The last time, hundreds of years ago, you "died" before you really messed up on anything. And all these years people've been dreaming and imagining and when they find you've come back they'll look at their pictures and their legends and they'll expect someone who can make it all right. But you can't. And what will they think, when they find that out?_

"Oh. I see." Fou-Lu nodded as he unfolded the meaning loaded in his reply. "Can't you just say no?"

He stared for a moment, then laughed that pained hex-laugh. "Thou art still…"

"Clueless?"

Fou-Lu shook his head. "Only naïve. I cannot in good conscience decline. Without any semblance of a leader there wilt be terrible strife in the land as they attempt to determine one. If I return it might well come to pass regardless, but were I to avoid it out of concern for my reputation, I wouldst not be deserving of it in any case."

"Oh. Okay, then." _About this, then, you're right. The world doesn't need gods, but it wouldn't hurt to make the way a bit smoother. If we didn't try to help, then I might as well have left the powers sealed away._ "Mami's coming with you?"

He nodded. "'Tis only reasonable. She is as deserving of comfort as the Wyndian princess, is she not?"

"Yeah. She is. Er. You'll make sure to write?"

At least this laugh sounded reasonably happy. "Of course. I wilt write. But perhaps 'tis premature. I hath not yet begun to go."

"No, not yet."

"I hath spoken with the woman from Chek. The Abbess."

"Really? What did she say?"

"She says that if thou dost value thy life, thou wilt not attempt such a thing again. In any case, 'tis no longer possible, as our power as well as our minds art once again rent in twain."

He shrugged. "I've done what I wanted to do with it." _No, I haven't. The people in Chek, General Rhun… they're all still dead. They must have known I couldn't go back for them after all._

Our power as well as our minds… so to do it safely we'd have to combine both - that's out. Saving Fou-Lu was the whole point of all this. So no more. P'ung Ryong ought to be happy. "So that's okay," he finished.

"I suppose it is. Though, I must ask… hast thou restored our immortality?"

"No."

"Ah." Fou-Lu nodded. "I didst fear that thou hast. But thou hast not. I thank thee. 'Twould be an excess of cruelty, to know I wouldst again outlive her."

* * *

A number of the inhabitants of Wyndia modified their daily routine in order to have a look at the pair traversing the main market. Both evidently looked familiar, having gone up to the castle a while ago and apart and not being seen again until the previous day. But surely, P'ung Ryong heard them whisper, his wings hadn't been so great before.

He leaned over to examine a table heaped with onions, trying not to bask in the attention. "How long wilt thou consent to remain in Wyndia?"

Ch'o Ryong joined him. "Till tomorrow, perhaps. We needs return to Worent to prepare for the impending marriage." She picked out a choice one and bought it.

"Indeed. Thou dost." They meandered over to a display of spices. "I hath spoken to the survivors of Chek regarding the possibility of more revivals."

"What didst they say?"

"As the power is sundered between them, 'twill be beyond their means to carry out such a feat without death being the result - unless they doth unite again. They will not."

"'Tis certain they will not?"

"For Ryu, at least, 'tis certain." He indicated one of the displays. "Hath we tasted of this before?"

She looked. "I believe not." He nodded and gave his order to the merchant, who hurriedly prepared his requests. When it was done and paid for they began on the way back to the castle. "The two of them - they art aware of this?"

"They art aware."

In the lift she said, "'Twas wise of him, to withhold our immortality." She laughed. "'Twould be such an inconvenience, now when we art so attached."

She was right. He'd become more attached to the world - to this version of Wyndia - than any immortal ought to let themselves become - it would be agony when all too soon the attachments were forcibly torn away. But if he wasn't immortal… well, then it wasn't a problem anymore, was it?

"When I hath departed to Worent," she said, "'Twill be a pleasure to hear from thee."

He smiled. "Verily. 'Twill be the same for me."

* * *

At first Ryu had been surprised when Fou-Lu told him what Nina had been willing to do to help him - certainly she never would have spoken of it herself, out of shame or modesty or both - but he got over it quickly. Yuna's life for Nina's would have been a fine bargain, and he was gratified to know she had thought the same way about him.

He nodded and continued to stare through the barred door. "I wanted to have a shout at him myself. But I guess I already had a chance in Astana."

Fou-Lu considered this, perhaps sifting through his own inheritance of memories, and finally said, "So thou hast."

Yuna lay on the floor of the cell, still in his rather neglected-looking robes, any movement not visible in the half-dark, but he was alive - Ryu's share of the power still granted him at least that much. Someone had put his hat in with him and it lay on its side. In the next cell over, the occupant belted out a dirty song.

Ryu turned away from the door. "Last night Nina said you didn't want to kill him either - why not?"

"'Twould hath injured Mami greatly to go against her wishes in this matter." Fou-Lu shrugged. "And 'tis of little consequence. His crimes shalt, instead, be paid for over the rest of his life. Art thou ready to take thy leave?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I am."

Outside they ran into Nina, who fretted over Ryu and insisted he sit down if not lie down for a while longer. When Fou-Lu had split off and they were ascending a stair together he said, "Thanks for that."

She realized what he meant and spun around. "You know?" He nodded and a pale red tinted her face. "It wasn't anything you wouldn't have done."

"That doesn't mean I can't thank you."

"It didn't even happen."

He reached for her hand. "It's the thought that counts." She laughed and curled her hand around his, and they were still laughing and joking an hour later.


	19. After the Dream

* * *

Chapter Nineteen: After the Dream

Nina shaded her eyes and peered at the top of the Kyoin Causeway. "When do you think he'll come back?"

Deis said, "When he's ready. Damn, I wish I'd gone with them."

"W… we wouldn't b-be wanted." Scias shrugged. "I-it's b-between them."

"Yes. It is, isn't it?" Nina couldn't help but feel left out, but then Ryu had never expected to be initiated into what went on between her and Elina. Why should she expect it to be any different for the other way around? It wasn't even as if Ryu was the one who was going to the Empire to stay. "You think the war'll end now, with Fou-Lu as the Emperor?"

"H-hope so. N…n-not as if I…" He grinned. "… n-need it a-anymore."

Deis stretched, weaving her fingers together above her head. "All I can say is it better or I'm going over there and giving him a piece of my mind."

Anyway with all that had happened, all that had gone wrong and been set right, being annoyed over not being there for the final-final-final goodbye seemed a bit trivial.

* * *

A crowd had gathered at the base of the steps leading up to the Astana Causeway, and they would be further up than that if it weren't for the line of soldiers, led by Ursula, holding them back. The sight of it as he looked outside made Ryu feel like he was rising and falling at the same time. When they saw him they looked ready to break the line, but then Ursula turned around, looked at him, then turned back and shook her head - _that's not him_, after which they calmed quickly but remained at a simmer. 

He ducked back in. "Be sure to write," he said. Fou-Lu nodded and draped an arm around Mami's shoulders; she reciprocated the gesture for a moment and returned to fidgeting with the bell tied into her hair.

The people hushed as Won-Qu stepped outside, followed shortly by A-Tur and then Ryu. Their silence lingered as Fou-Lu and Mami came out hand in hand, then shattered into cheers and shrieks. Ursula's voice rose above it. "Come this way, Your Majesty," she called, "it's all been taken care of."

They didn't go right away. First they turned to Ryu, and Fou-Lu raised his free hand, attached to a stiffly angled arm. Mami was less reserved, sweeping her entire arm in impressive arcs. The last goodbye - all the others had been made back in Wyndia and in Kyoin.

The clamor grew still louder. _They want their sacrifice, _he thought suddenly, crazily. _Now they'll eat him alive. _

In a far more recent memory Fou-Lu said,_ I cannot in good conscience decline. Without any semblance of a leader there wilt be terrible strife in the land as they attempt to determine one. If I return it might well come to pass regardless, but were I to avoid it out of concern for my reputation, I wouldst not be deserving of it in any case. _

Yeah. Yes, I know.

Already Won-Qu and A-Tur had descended the steps, and already the crowd was pulling away to make a clear path. Ryu lifted his own hand and waved back so hard that he'd have to be a bit careful with his shoulder for a while. "Goodbye!"

After a few seconds of this, as the voices grew to a crescendo, Fou-Lu's arm relaxed and he waved back as well, though not nearly as frantically as Ryu. "Farewell," he said, and they nodded at one another before Fou-Lu and Mami turned and began down the steps. Ryu kept on waving for a while longer, then lowered his arm and waited until they could no longer be seen.

Later Ryu thought that he couldn't possibly have heard it over all the noise. But back then, he had heard it clear enough, and as he returned to Kyoin and during the journey home - for Wyndia was as good a home as any - he remembered most of all the sound of the bell.

END

* * *

I'm probably sounding like a parrot by now, but thanks once again to:

Raya  
Raistlin Majere  
Bill  
Tami  
Aegis  
Flaring Star-Saber  
Saikan  
GenocideHeart  
Silver Kitsune  
Airess Byrd  
Torii  
Crimson Primrose  
Alpha Draconis1  
Oni-Kaiser  
The Right Hand Of Fate  
Dracorum  
HeartlessAngel  
Anyone I overlooked, and everyone who might care to review after this goes up.

AND Capcom, for making Breath of Fire IV in the first place!

It's been great!


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